Pushing the Color Envelope
 

Do you have an eye for coordinating fabrics and colors in your quilts? Yes, we can always play it safe and use a charm pack or layer cake. The coordinating is done for us.

Do you push the envelope with fabric choices?

I am just ready to step out of the comfort zone when selecting fabrics for my next quilt. It has been a fun exercise for me to pick colors and designs that might not typically go together. I think mixing patterns will give the quilt a little bit of an edge.

Here is a sneak peak. Some are from a fabric collection so a little safe. There are still a few selections
to make with gray and teal blues but I'm almost there.

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I'm one of those people who plays it safe- boring!!!!!!!! I like what you've chosen and I need to be a little more adventurous :)

The four grays on the left are up for consideration.

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I guess I'm a pusher. I tell my daughter, "It will match when it's sewn together." Of course, that isn't always the case, but it does help choose fabrics.

The scrappier the better! But it's a lot hot harder choosing a set of a dozen or so fabrics than it is just throwing a hundred together. I still prefer to select fabrics from my stash, rather than use kits or collections, although I have somehow accumulated quite a few of those.

I feel like I'm cheating somehow if I use a "collection" because for me the most fun is choosing fabrics. I will use a precut collection if I really love it, which is seldom, or if I need to come up with a quick quilt. Most often I will use a print or three from a collection and then use that for my color scheme and then go to town with my stash.

I love to play with color, pattern, scale, texture, even fabric type. I am a little less likely to play with different fabric types and textures if I'm making a quilt for someone to use as a covering, but color is always something that I play with. The few times I've used a fabric collection I ended up pulling other things from my stash to "jazz it up".

Rob

I'm not color-blind, but I have difficulty with choosing colors that would "look good", although the prettiest quilt I ever made was a strip quilt where I consciously chose all of my "ugly" fabrics that I knew I would never use. Can't wait to see what you come up with!

Color selections for a quilt is the hardest part for me when it comes to making a quilt. I grew up in the 50's & took Home Economics & every time we sewed something colors had to match/go together. So, if I made a skirt, the blouse had to have one of the colors in the skirt in it so it would "match". So for me to select a blue that would go next to a green is so hard for me to do. However, that being said, I love quilts that don't match in color.

I like your color selections & can't wait to see what you do with them.

I've not used kits yet. I have a couple, but they just sit. I don't buy collections. My process is that I choose a pattern, then "see" it finished. Then I find the fabrics that match my vision. Sometimes that forces me outside my comfort zone on colors or patterns of fabric. Sometimes I think to myself, "maybe you need your vision checked...what were you thinking!?"