Fine-Tune the Fabric Mix
Once you’ve selected a few fabrics, combining them successfully may take patience, experience, and a willingness to just play around with the fabrics.
One of the best ways to tell if your fabric combination will work is to step back from it. Fabrics that don’t appear to work when viewed up close may be perfect from a distance, where you can see a fabric’s contribution to the whole. Remember that each piece is just a fraction of the total finished product.
Test your block design and fabric selections by mocking up a block. Cut fabric pieces for one block to the finished size (leave off the seam allowances; these test pieces won’t be used in the finished project). Sketch the block design on graph paper and glue the fabric pieces on the paper to create a mock block.
Place the block several feet away to view the design and color combination. If desired, make additional blocks to test alternate fabric choices. To further test the color and layout, make color photocopies of the mock block. Use the copies to begin planning the quilt top. Keep an eye out for patterns that emerge based on how you turn the blocks. Check color placement in adjacent blocks and make sure you like what’s happening. If not, use a different combination of fabrics.
Having a vertical surface to lay out fabric choices can help you visualize how they will look in a quilt. For a permanent design wall, cover a foam-core board with flannel to hold small pieces in place. You also could use the flannel back of a vinyl tablecloth, rolling it up between projects.
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More to check out:
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Four-Square Pillow
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