The Endeavourers’ Reveal Day: Vintage

It’s time for the reveal of the quarterly challenge of the online art quilt group, The Endeavourers.

This time the theme was “Vintage”.  I love using vintage textiles, and I have already done two pieces in their whites and creams —

Memories, from January 2021.

Quilt Quest game, from October, 2022.

— so this time I wanted to add color, and I spent two days painting old napkins and dresser scarves with thinned-down Setacolor paints.

I wanted to make a bouquet.  I found ideas for images and techniques in these two books, both of which highlight the work of Japanese quilters. 

Fabled Flowers by Kumiko Sudo, 1996, The Quilt Digest Press, and A Bouquet of Quilts, 2002, C & T Publishing.

A Bouquet of Quilts¹ has projects that were originally published in Quilts Japan magazine.  I am amazed that any of them caught my eye, because they were photographed in shadow, and there aren’t any good detail photos in the book.  But the basket shape from the Dutch Treat pattern reminded me of a favorite McCoy vase.

McCoy vase.

Zoomed in on the Dutch Treat pattern that caught my eye.

In that same book, there was a beautiful design with simple flowers called Watering Can Bouquet — here it is, all hand-embroidered and hand-quilted by Leslie Fehling. I wanted to combine similar flowers (not ultra-realistic ones) with the basket.

I looked at many applique technique books, and in the end I drew from the origami-style of Kumiko Sudo.  She creates dimensional flowers by sewing two layers of delicate fabrics together, turning them, folding them into petals and leaves, and using those parts to construct flowers.

A sample of Sudo’s technique, here showing how to make a bud.

So those were my basic resources.  But this is where using painted vintage textiles saved me a lot of effort!  I did not have to sew layers of fabric to get a finished edge; I was able to use the already-finished edges.  Hemstitching, satin-stitched edges, rolled hems, and crocheted edges all gave me decorative detail with no additional work.  And where I had to cut into the fabric, the paint stabilized the edge and there was no raveling.

So I had fun constructing simple flowers and adding a few beads and buttons.

Vintage Bouquets.

The central basket.

The pink basket. I especially love the way that the paint shows off the delicate applique of this handkerchief.

The very simple buds. Sating stitching on the edges of this huck cloth napkin give definition to the edge of the sepals.

I actually did the quilting of the background before I attached any of the baskets or flowers; there are just a few vertical lines.

I am very happy with this piece.  Back in our fourth challenge, Improvisation, I had tried to make a similar bouquet, but I used the fabric paints full strength on a vintage napkin, and I constructed some flowers and then painted them. 

“Dutch Bouquet,” for the Improv theme.

I think the thinned paints on fabric are much more successful.  They do give enough body to the fabric that making small, delicate pieces is not really possible, but it would be easy to combine silk or commercial cotton fabrics with the painted linens.

And I still have plenty of those painted fabrics left, to make more pieces!

Please drop by The Endeavourers blog to see the other results of our “Vintage” theme!

 

¹the link takes you to the Google Books preview, where you can see 21 of the 64 pages of this book.  The photo of the Dutch Treat pattern is shown on the back cover.  I have shown it here with considerable editing so that you can actually see the detail.  🙂

Category : Quilting
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