Blogger's Quilt Festival - Spring 2012

It's that time again.  The spring version of the Bloggers' Quilt Festival over at Amy's Creative Side.  What a great way to see a quilt show and never leave your recliner. 

This is my 4th time to join in the festival.  It gets harder every time to pick just one quilt to showcase,   I've loved the creative process with each project and to date haven't made a quilt where "What was I thinking?" has been the first thought that came to mind when it was completed.  The subject of this post was a long time in the planning stages, but the end result was worth the wait. 

Have you ever come across a piece of fabric that just speaks to you?  You see it and know it's just the perfect focus piece for a project for someone special.  About 5 years ago, I spied just such a special fabric when I was innocently pursuing fabrics on line. 

The rich colors of the Geisha caught my eye.  My brother's daughter loves the Asian culture.  This was just the right piece for a quilt for her.  Once it arrived, the thought processes went into high gear, picking the coordinating fabrics and trying to find just the right quilt pattern to showcase this piece.  The Geisha is about 20 inches tall, so the first thought was to use it as a central panel.  Everything I came up with was way to dark and heavy.  I wanted to use a dark blue and gold in the setting fabrics.  I'd come back to the design board every few months, but still couldn't come up with a setting that worked.  After about 4 years of playing around with the the formal medallion set, the idea to offset the panel and make it more scrappy came to mind.  That was the right path.  So about 5 years after I bought the fabric, the Geisha quilt was finished. 

Trudy Lindemann did the quilting. A beautiful all over fan design,

mainly in dark blue thread.  But spread out over the quilt is an occasional gold fan.  In the Geisha panel the quilting is a combination of outline and ripples that make the blue background look like water. 

I had hoped to give the completed quilt to my niece for Christmas last year, but I only managed to finish the top.  So she got the top with a note that I'd finish it for her after the new year.  Now it's all bound and labeled, just waiting till we make the trip back home so I can give her the completed quilt. 

Thanks for letting me share one of my favorite projects.  Check out all the other gorgeous eye candy posted on the Bloggers' Quilt Festival.