I have linked my CWs to my lace travels and each one has been seen at an OIDFA Lace Congress. Inspiration was a piece of bobbin lace seen at the 2018 Congress in Zaandam, The Netherlands.

Strip piecing, raw edge applique and shadow quilting.

Carol’s quilt included a couple of Japanese feel fabrics so I decided to add to this by having a branch of plum blossom. The flowers were fussy cut and just attached with a little gold bead. More beads were added to give the feel of reflections in the water. The branch was drawn with an Inktense pencil.

I was delighted to receive a Japanese panel which allowed me to go Japanese again and gave me the opportunity to use a small strip of green fabric I had been saving for something special. It was only just big enough for the top and bottom border of my fan panel and I am happy to have used it at last.

Seeing the fan, I decided to challenge myself, and made 12 mini fans — I confess they are fused, not pieced.

“Fuzzy Fans”

Elements taken: repeating 12 quarter circle fans on a white background-

Techniques used: space dyed coloured felt appliqued fans on a cream woollen background embellished with Stef Francis space dyed thread – machine quilted.

Barbara sent me a piece whose red shapes immediately said ‘Japan’ to me. What more well-known represent-ation than Mount Fuji? Thus I found myself full circle as the mountains of Iceland inspired my first piece and Japan’s famous mountain provided the inspiration for my last piece. I turned to a wonderful photo that my husband took during our visit to Japan and once again used bonded appliqué and machine quilting. I copied the snow lines carefully and used a shiny satin for this area.

Original photo: tomatoes from my allotment. A Great summer crop.

Tomatoes on the vine, experiment- ed with string, couched down and beads for the first time on a quilt.

For some reason when I saw Angela's quilt I just saw these orange circles. A good chance to practice the circle applique I'd learnt with Philippa Naylor.

Every time I looked at the photo I kept seeing oranges so decided to make them the theme of my quilt. The oranges and lemons are raw edge applique and the wording is hand couched. i tried to keep the colour palette similar to that in the photo.

“Whirligigs”

Elements taken: orange and yellow colouring, circles and semicircles and radiating lines.

Techniques used: raw edge applique, embell-ished hand applique, variegated thread and coloured buttons

Barbara’s quilt was cheerful
and full of movement. My mother made a book of cuttings from 1950s craft magazines. A five-petal circular flower design was perfect!

Background: “made” fabric left over from Kate Dowty workshop. Hand applique: herring-bone for flowers and leaves, narrow bias stems blind hemmed. Zigzagged edge finish (Terry Grant).

Photo taken from plane returning from Scilly (July 2018), a reminder of a unique flight.I like making map quilts. This image has a strong pattern made by the roads.

Machine piecing (Ruth B. McDowall’s freezer paper method), quilting and couching. Hand applique, quilting and embroidery. Faced edge finish (Philippa Naylor).

Having received an Alicia Merritt type map, I decided I would make a map of the two cities I have lived in here in England, so I printed maps of Plymouth and Exeter, chopped them up and stitched them back together. I rather like the resulting fragmented map this technique produced.

The Athens Congress, 2006 as I had been sent a CW with a Compass in the design.  It was unusually hot for May, the hills were cooling and the sea warm. I use lace fabric for the EPP applied to the background of overlayed machine applique.

Tthe Eight: I received a quilt of a boat on a beach, very precise shapes making the pattern with a back-ground of sunrays; I used lots of fiddly applique, string and sunrays inspired by the boat and beach quilt I had received before. I love art deco prints and this is taken from one.

My challenge photo was a picture I instantly recognised. I love art deco posters and decided to keep a period feel and turn mine into a stained glass window. I kept to the same colour palette and tried to reflect the narrow black of the oars and fan shapes of the yellow waves.

“When Intense Ink met Art Deco.”

Elements taken: Art Deco design. Tech- niques used: I purchased a set of these pencils in order to do a workshop at the Guild AGM in 2020 which was cancelled due to Covid. I did not have the courage to experiment with them on my own but was encouraged to do so having watched a Zoom lecture by Joanna O’Neil and read an article she wrote in the winter edition of P and Q- 2020. The colouring is more tricky than you might think! A complex design stitched and coloured, then shadow quilted with machine quilting using black thread.