Portals to the Orient
 

This was a true LABOR of love, with the emphasis on labor! This quilt took well over 200 hours to go from design concept to finished quilt! Still have to attach the label :p once I embroider it. However, it was truly a labor of love. This quilt is for my best friend. She has an oriental theme in her bedroom, however no specific period, color family or specific type of asian (japanese, chinese, korean...etc) So I had a bit of effort getting the concept done.

I came across a free pattern at hoffman fabrics, (Samoyi - please note, Hoffman has several very nice patterns that accent oriental prints, it is a great resource) that looked nice, but I didnt like how they did it. So I used it for the inspiration and designed my own. I bought 21 different oriental fabrics, fussy cut many of the circles. I did do a sample piece to test out pattern and quilting designs. (photo here: Portals Sample)

I finally got her quilt on the frame and quilted. It turned out stunning if I do say so myself! :) The quilt is 3yds by 3yds ....which sounds kinda small till you realize that is 9 FEET by 9 FEET! The only place large enough to photograph this quilt was off my deck, my son helped by holding it (he reminded me his own wing span is not 9 feet, I told him to wing it :p )

And the quilt is heavy as the dickens, I can barely hold it to fold it! Gonna cost me a fortune to mail to New Mexico!


So without further ado, I bring you "Portals to the Orient" (and that is portals vs portholes, not sure why I chose the door definition rather than the window one....but alas, such is life!)

Quilt Name: Portals to the Orient
Quilt Pattern: designed by myself, inspired by Hoffman Fabrics Samoyi
Batting: Hobbs Washable Wool
Quilting: Custom, hand guided, the circles was inspired by Feline Fanatic when I asked her for help!
Thread: Sulky Gold metallic (for the applique of circles), Glide in both black and white for the quilting

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Some close ups, best I could do with light I had

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And the back:
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very nice quilt and quilting

Wow it's beautiful front and back, your friend will cherish it and you for your labor of love.

I am envious of your deck for large quilt photos.

Gorgeous quilt and your quilting is awesome

it came out great! i love the circle quilting around the circles... thanks for the close ups

Love everything about this quilt.

Beautiful fabrics and love your quilting design. :)

This is so beautiful! Great design, piecing, and quilting! Love it. I bet you get lots of requests to be your friend!!

Very pretty, I like the fabrics and the design, if its too expensive to ship to New Mexico, you could always ship to Scotland lol x

Oh, wow! The pattern is beautiful-enough work right there- but then you add all of that intricate, detail in the quilting too? Magnificent!! Worth every minute of "labor"!!