D & C Wedding Quilt

I made this quilt for Miles’ brother, Dominic’s, wedding last weekend. I had wanted to make a quilt which incorporated scraps as they are something I have rather a lot of and I think they can work well in a gift as the recipients can mull over it, choosing the fabrics they like best rather than being offered big swathes of what you hope they’ll like! I originally wanted to do a traditional double wedding rings pattern which uses small scraps against a light background. However time constraints and my own inexperience (paper piecing and curves, oh dear) meant that I came up with this modified design. I found a beige background fabric with a pattern of small navy blue fronds (that’s the best I can describe them!) called “Deja’ Blues”. (I love the romanticised names of the American Victorian repro fabrics: they often seem to be along the lines of ‘Confederate Star’ or ‘Belle of the South’. Funny how designers don’t go in for names such as ‘Toiler in the Cotton Fields’ or ‘Exploited Northern Mill Worker’, though…).

Anyway, back to the point at hand, I cut out scrap strips of various lengths then stitched them into long ribbons (lots of seam pressing) and pieced everything together using a sort of contracted log cabin which I think gives a woven effect from a distance. Obviously, although I have plenty of my own scraps, I decided that I needed more and bought a scrap bag from Alicia. I was looking for small scale, generally floral prints and her bag came up trumps. It’s nice to think that her off-cuts found a new home!

I included only one piece of plain fabric on the top, a raspberry taffeta, which I used to embroider ‘D♥C 28.07.07’ for Dominic and Carolyn and their wedding date. I’ve not tried to do letters and numbers in embroidery before (hence the heart not an ampersand – simpler lines!) and I think they came out ok, apart from being a tiny bit wonky!

I’m really pleased with how well the navy polka dot border picks up the blue of the fronds (loving that word). On the back I used the Heather Ross West Hill Matryoshka dolls print in brown, and, as I didn’t have enough for the full width, I put in a couple of edging strips in dark brown. Dominic has a wonderful sense of humour and, as the dolls make me smile, I thought they honoured that in a rather roundabout way (having consulted Miles on this point, he agreed). Although I would have liked to have done the quilting by hand the fact that I only had two days to do it and the binding meant that I machine quilted around each of the eighty squares (overall the quilt came in at about 170cm x 130cm). Bizarrely the quilting was really tiring: having to push and pull the whole fat sandwich through the gap under the machine arm took much more effort than just leisurely quilting on your lap!

Thanks as ever to Miles for being my glamorous assistant, glimpsed here holding up the quilt. I didn’t manage to get a picture of Dominic and Carolyn with their quilt but as they both looked so lovely on the day I feel they deserve a photographic mention!