I have been pushing ahead with Sidmouth Revisited recently, as I need to get it finished now so it can appear in Today's Quilter's Christmas issue. The photo above shows me tracing the feather circle in the centre, before the last four borders were added. I have an A2 slimline lightbox which is so useful for work like this.
Lilian Hedley drew this wonderful feather circle/wreath for me when we did her North Country design course at The Royal, Bridlington, last October.
The original Sidmouth Quilt has a central circle motif which is almost but not quite a true feather circle - more like a double circle with slanting lines. But as I am not making a replica quilt and I'm only using the original's quilting designs as a starting point, I wanted to have a proper feather circle in the centre instead. Yesterday I called at Just Sew in Penrith and bought a rather lovely cream cotton sateen for the backing, because I want the quilting design to show really nicely on the back, rather than being somewhat camouflaged by a print. It should show very well on the cotton sateen. The back of the original Sidmouth Quilt is shown below.
Mary Jenkins has written several recent blog posts about the Mary Lloyd quilt in the collection at St Fagan's museum - about the quilting and about the applique and patchwork. This quilt uses the same centre panel as the Sidmouth Quilt. There are also some similarities in the quilting, notably in the extensive use of cross hatching or square diamonds, which Mary had mentioned being more typical of the early C20th in Wales and not seen much before. I wonder if the Sidmouth Quilt is originally from Wales?
6 comments:
Wonderful project - love following this! Thanks for the video - what a clever way to draw the wreath!
Is the cotton sateen that you bought a special quilters one and do they keep it in other colours do you know? I'm finding it difficult to find stockists for quilters sateen now.
Hi Liz,
They were selling it as a quilting fabric and it is quilting beautifully. It feels very much like the old Roman Sateen that the North Country quilters used so much but alas it is only in cream. It might dye very well and evenly in the washing machine though, and I have kept all the offcuts for dyeing experiments! Lilian Hedley is the person to contact re where to buy quilters sateeen. I'll ask her.
Thanks for this Susan, it sounds ideal and it wil be interesting to hear what Lilian says. I hope to see you at the WTD Mundford in Sept, will you have Sidmouth Revisited with you?
Hi Liz,
Lilian said she hasn't really been keeping up with who has coloured sateens lately, as she's awaiting another knee op and hasn't been doing much teaching. So sorry we haven't got any more info there.
I won't have the quilt with me in September, as it will be with Today's Quilter for photography by then and as the deadline is 25th August, they will probably be doing photography and pattern checking over the next two weeks. I'll have to enter it in a few shows next year, so people can see it close up! There will be lots of photos in the Christmas issue of Today's Quilter, with the pattern (and the quilting patterns).
Thank you for asking Lilian about the sateen, I hope that her knee op goes well when she has it. I took out a subscription to Today's Quilter at the FOQ as it's very difficult to get a copy here so will definitely look forward to that issue!
Post a Comment