Four Sided Kaleidoscope Needs List

Four Sided Kaleidoscope quilt

In this one day class students will be shown how to create kaleidoscope blocks using one fabric using a four pattern repeat.  No block is alike.  Think of this quilt as a mystery quilt.  You have no idea how it will look until you have sewn all your blocks and laid them out.  Watch your blocks spin.  Every block has three different individual looks that you can choose from before it is sewn.

Original Fabric

Transformed into this

Benedictus Tiles

City Scapes

Needs List

Sewing machine:     ¼” sewing foot  
                                    New needle + Spares
                                    Bobbins
Quilt tools:                15” long clear ruler (usually 6 or 6.5” wide)
                                    Square ruler (any size between 6”& 10”)
                                    Rotary cutter and cutting board                             
Other items:             Quilting pins
                                    Quick n pick - unpicker
                                    Scissors
Optional - Large sheet to lay out & pin your blocks (if there is time)

Thread:                     Thread to blend with purchased fabrics for piecing.

                                   (I usually use a standard mid grey or mid beige thread)

Fabric:                         Make sure the fabric you purchase is in one continuous piece.  Fat quarters and                              off cuts will not work.

In my experience the smaller the print designs the more likely that each repeat may not be precise.  Look for a medium to large print with a variety of colour or depth of colour with interesting shapes.  Make sure you love it.

Avoid: lots of straight lines, lots of circles and blank spaces.  Check that there is the correct number of pattern repeats when buying your fabric.

You will require 4 repeats of a pattern of your chosen fabric.  When shopping for your fabric,

take your measuring tape.  Most patterns are repeated approximately 24” or 12”.

If 24” you will need approximately 2.5 metres.  I recommend purchasing 3 metres.  This gives you a little extra fabric to accent borders or for binding
If 12” you will require approx 1.3 meters (I recommend 1.5m). Double this quantity for a larger size quilts i.e. approx 3 metres. 
I’ve started to purchase an additional metre for each kaleidoscope quilt I make and sew it into my backing fabric of the quilt as a reminder of what the original fabric looked like.

  

Shirls

Four sided Kaleidoscope class - Coastal Quilters

Wow I had fun on Saturday in the Technology block at Plimmerton School with members of Coastal Quilters. Great class and relaxed atmosphere.
Check out these photographs.

To create more spin these blocks were
cut into triangles. 

These look far better on point and blocks will "pop" when surrounded by a
solid colour.



To reduce the strong red strip from over
powering this delicate print squares
were then sub-cut into triangles
thus reducing the strong red strip
and enhancing the elegant flowers.

 By double pinning the center seams (June Nixey tip) before sewing - each student had perfect seams.

Four sided Kaleidoscopes

Over the later part of this year I will running classes on four sided kaleidoscopes.

Buying fabric for this can be scary.  There is no right or wrong answer because at the end of the day - you have to love the fabric.  Fabric should have either a lot of colour interest and or interesting shapes. 
Here are some examples:

Border fabrics work well if there is a variety in the design.

This is pretty wild.  I'll post a picture of this quilt finished at a later date.

This fabric (from the Benedictus collection) has a lot of different shapes and colour

Using the picture above, I'll take you through my journey creating my four sided kaleidoscope.

Always buy the correct number of repeats.  For example - four sided kaleidoscope - four repeats, six sided kaleidoscope - six repeats etc.  I always buy either an additional repeat or 1/2 metre.  This extra fabric maybe included in borders or binding or I may sew into the backing as a reference. 
The fabric above has a very narrow repeat so I chose to purchase twice the quantity needed.  The smaller the repeat - the smaller the quilt so determine how big you want your quilt and buy the quantity of fabric accordingly.

Once you have determined your block size and sewn your blocks - next comes the laying out.  Its pretty exciting making each block as they become unique.  Its the final laying out that can be daunting.  The following photos were taking on my mobile so the quality isn't fantastic.  This quilt is a wall hanging so I was able to use a design wall to test my layouts.

Layout 1 - is ok - didn't give me the full wow factor I was looking for.

sorry - this one is pretty blurry - however you can see what's happening here.
I did like this - had a "Pacific" feel about it.

This layout was using my "random" method.  Stick each block up
and don't move it around.  I decided to insert thin black sashing strips between each block.
One of my friends suggested white. We seem so quick to use black enhance
our blocks.

This is "Benedictus Tiles" complete.

So where did I get the name Benedictus Tiles come from.  Recently I have started naming my quilts with some reference to the fabric or fabric designer.  After all, the designers have spent hours designing their fabric and I feel that by using their fabric name, is my way of acknowledging their cleverness.  Because without it I couldn't chop it up and create my own design.
This fabric is called Fuchsia Leaves from the Benedictus  collection of fabrics designed by Victoria and Albert museum.  I found it interesting that a museum has its own collections. 

So since my quilt is not square or a rectangle I have inserted a support rod so that when the quilt is hung by the hanging sleeve the sides will not curl.  In this case I had a piece of 2mm plastic cut as I didn't want to run the risk of wood bleeding marks into my quilt - especially since I have used so much white.

I made a casing and hand stitched it onto the back of my quilt

To give you and idea of size I have placed the plastic rod on top of my casing

The back of my quilt with the casing and rod inserted. 

I hope you have enjoyed reading through today's post.  Happy quilting.

Four Sided Kaleidoscopes

Last Saturday I held my first Four Sided Kaleidoscope Class for the year.  My camera skills weren't up to standard so I'm sorry about the quality of these pictures.

Before

The beginnings of a new design

Before

I look forward to seeing these quilts completed. 
Now one of these wonderful ladies emailed me a picture of her completed 6 sided kaleidoscope from one of my classes last year.  Sorry Mary, I couldn't get BlogSpot to  display your picture in the right direction.

Marys original fabric



4 Sided Kaleidsoscope

In my previous post (15th December 2013), I talk about my exploration of working with one fabric quilts - in this case 4 sided kaleidoscope quilts.  I posted a picture of my next fabric challenge.

I started cutting yesterday and I'm very excited about how this quilt is progressing - so I thought I would give you a sneak peek.

Love it when new projects start coming together.

 

Happy stitching 

working with one fabric - four sided kaleidoscope blocks

Fabric designers spend hours coming up with their unique fabric designs for us quilters, crafters and dressmakers to ooh and ahh over before purchasing.

I have been doing a personal study over the last couple of years making quilts from one fabric.  Basically I chop up a designer's fabric and re sew it making up a different look.  I have used 6 sided kaleidoscope blocks to create these.

Kay Nickels wrote a book years ago about making four sided kaleidoscope blocks from border fabric.  Using her idea of using border fabric and cutting the fabric in the same method I use in a six sided kaleidoscope,  I created  the quilt below (it is finished - but unnamed). 


Border fabric is the fabric used for the center of this quilt.

I wasn't overly happy with the result.  It was ok but I didn't consider it to have that WOW factor.  So I tried again.  This time using fabric from Christine Graf's Sausalito series.



Christine Grafs border fabric from her 2012 Sausalito Series

There is a lot of variation in the design and patterns and the final outcome did have the WOW factor (well I think so :))


Madeliefje

So my next idea is to experiment using this technique on fabrics that are not designed as borders.  Would it work?  My first attempt failed.  In fact I cut up the fabric and could see as I placed the blocks onto my design wall that it wouldn't work.  No point sewing the blocks together.

I had a hunt around Thimbles and Threads recent sale and bought "terrain" by Kate Spain.  Cut it up and this is the result:

I can't seem to turn my photo to the right direction.  Anyway, the fabric in my border is the original design.  Although it has worked and looks ok I wouldn't call it an overall success (I'd rate it 6 out of 10).  Its pinned ready for quilting.

So my next attempt was with a beautiful border fabric (Savonnerie by American Jane for Moda which comes in three colour ways) that can be found at Sawmillers (Yvonne imports direct from overseas).  I chose the cream background as a personal challenge (I don't tend to work in cream).  It seemed a real shame to cut it up - but I had to see what it could do.

Now I bought about 2 meters and unfortunately what I had hoped would work didn't.  The narrow border created strong lines which dominated the overall design.  So in this case, I had to cut the fabric into three different sizes to give this final look.  Final outcome is interesting, possibly 8 out of 10 in my WOW factor gauge but for the amount of fabric bought, I have a small quilt (lots of wasted blank space).  Does have a Christmas feel about it.

So what next?  I'm still not quite finished exploring the four sided kaleidoscope.  On a road trip last week I found this fabric at Krazy Cow. Its called Hotflash by Luella Doss and Andrea Schuster.

Will be interesting to see how this fabric will work.  I'm attracted to the various random shapes and although the colours are the same depth  - there should be enough busyness to make this work.


 In the mean time, hope you all have a merry and safe Christmas.

Happy quilting. Shirls