Monday, February 22, 2016

Another new quilt start...Marcelle Medallion

After a few weeks of very pleasant (if not too easy on the eyesight) hand sewing, I managed to get my Marcelle medallion central star stitched up and completed early last week (I think, I am losing track!). After reading up on quite a few of the quiltalong posts and tutorials from a couple of years ago, I chose to English paper piece this star in order to avoid the dreaded y-seams and keep my points nice and precise. I found the epp trickier than I anticipated; the shapes were bigger than the hexies I usually work with and a little harder to work with, and by the time I came to joining the 4 quarters together, they had been handled quite a lot already from joining all the component pieces, so the paper was slipping out in places where I had been relaxed about securing them in place.



Having said all that, I was really very pleased with how it turned out. The points aren't competely perfect but I don't think that's too noticeable (I hope not!) and its lying relatively flat. I like the 3d effect from using different values in the star points. I decided to put on the first border straight away to stabilise it a little and made a quick decision to use a texty fabric in a ruler print. The comination of this against the dark purple star points and the poor light in the photo makes it look quite a bit darker than it is in reality.  It does feel lighter and brighter in real life, although I think the dark purple print is dominating it more than I anticipated, and making me reconsider my original plan for the colours for the next triangle border. I had intended using a variety of purple and lilac prints, but now I am pondering other colour combos....if you have any ideas, please do share!

I do love the process of making medallions, and am so glad I started this one. It will be my 3rd medallion quilt, I've done a Made to Measure (Sarah Fielke's beautiful pattern), and I did a baby medallion a few years ago as part of the Modern Quilters Ireland medallion-along. Serendiptiously, Modern Quilters Ireland are running a Round Robin Bee, and encouraging members to sew along on medallion quilts if we are not participating in the Bee (which I am not this year), so I am going to sew along with them for part of the Bee at least.

3 comments:

Ellyn said...

what a beautiful start! I never thought to EPP the center. I foundation paper pieced mine & was really pleased with the result. It's a fun quilt! I know yours will be beautiful whatever colors you choose!

Ruth said...

oranges maybe for the next round? I am trying to use darker prints more lately - I love the way Sarah Fielke used them in the Made to Measure medallion too.

Unknown said...

Love the border print! Maybe bring the aqua out of the centre in your next round :)