I decided to enter this quilt in the Blogger's Quilt Festival over at Amy's Creative Side. I made it about 3 years ago as a challenge to use some really, really ugly fabric that my friend Joyce had bought and then thought better of. It's called "Cosmology: Creatio ex Foedo" Cosmology is a play on the fabric line Cosmos from Connecting Threads which I used to complete the quilt, and which is not ugly; and Creatio ex Foedo is Latin for "creation out of the ugly."
You can see the ugly fabric in the center of each block and in the cornerstones. It is this wacky combination of grass green, magenta pink, yellow and orangey-green. But! If you combine the ugly fabric with a bunch of pretty fabric and make sure the ugly fabric is cut up in smallish pieces, it works.
I used a pattern called Glory Bee from a book by Evelyn Sloppy. The original quilt is in patriotic red-white-blue colors, but I decided to pull fabric in magentas, greens, and golds, including a lot of light greens and yellows as well as darker greens. I used my collection of fat quarters in the "Cosmos" line and another collection of shot cottons by Kaffe Fassett, plus a whole bunch of other fabrics, and the pretty fabrics took the ugly right out of the theme fabric. The quilt has an interesting effect of looking like dappled light in a vineyard or a garden because of all the variations of value, and it's now hanging in my dining room. I think it's funny that the more quilts I make, the less "planned" and the more scrappy I tend to go. I loved both of those fabric collections, but could never get inspired to use them until I had an ugly fabric to combine them with.
It's quilted in an allover squiggle pattern with variegated green thread. It measures 60"x74", so would be a twin-size quilt if put on a bed.
Be sure to check out some of the other quilts in the Festival! It's a great chance twice-yearly for quilt bloggers to show and tell.
9 comments:
What a fun and pretty quilt!
Judy
Absolutely beautiful!
Like they say, if a fabric is still ugly you haven't cut it small enough! You did a great job on this quilt.
Lovely!
The scrapppy look of this quilt appeals to me.
What a great idea for using up fabric that you don't love or outgrow! Thanks so much for sharing the lovely quilt!
I am fascinated by red and green quilts. They are always a challenge to me. Love how you used some "uglies" and made them into a beauty!
; )
Isn't it amazing how someone else's "oh yuck" fabric becomes a stunning awesome quilt when someone, like yourself, has the vision to see beyond the "oh yuck". Beautifully gone! And awesome job of using the fabric! Wow!
Very nice! Great combination of colors!
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