The quilt I’m sharing today was made by my friend and fellow Charlotte Quilters’ Guild member Marguerite. It’s a project she started during the Pandemic, experimenting with using Terial Magic in lieu of traditional tearaway or cutaway stabilizers, various decorative threads, programmed stitches on her Bernina sewing machine, etc. When I saw this unquilted top hanging forlorn and forgotten in her studio, I asked if I could quilt it for her as payback for a HUGE favor she did for me in a time of need (that’s why I call this one The Godfather, because “Some day, I will ask of you a favor…” 😅) Not only did Marguerite agree to let me quilt it, but she uttered the most dangerous words imaginable...
“Just Do Whatever You Want With It!”
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| Marguerite’s 60 x 60 Appliqué Quilt with Bee and Lady Bird E2E Quilting |
I very rarely agree to select a quilting design without any input at all from the client. My usual practice is to consult with clients about quilting designs, batting and thread options when they drop off their quilt top (or once they’ve shipped it to me), and then I make recommendations based not just on what I see but also on what drew the client to select that pattern and those fabrics, who the quilt is for, and how it will be used. I can usually envision two dozen totally different quilting designs that would look great on every quilt top I see. Listening to a client talk about her quilt is just as important as looking at her quilt if I want the client to be over-the-moon delighted once the quilt is finished. But Marguerite insisted, "Just do whatever you want."
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| I Quilted Bugs All Over Marguerite’s Quilt, And She’s Still Friends With Me |
I briefly considered custom quilting on this one: You know, this design for the sashing, that design for the corner squares, quilting some additional “ghost flowers” along the border vines and subdividing the center of the quilt with different fills in different sections. But Marguerite does a fantastic job of her own custom quilting using rulers and free motion motifs on her hand guided sit-down long arm machine, and if she wanted it quilted that way she could have done that beautifully herself. Moreover, in addition to saying "just do whatever you want," she'd also said "just do an edge-to-edge," so I settled on this Bee and Lady Bird design from Scottish designer Dastardly Line.
