“Marrakesh” Quilt Top

Turkey Tracks: November 30, 2020

“Marrakesh” Quilt Top

For the first project of Season 3 of the online class The Color Collective Tara Faughnan designed her “Marrakesh” block and curated a selection of 12 Kona cotton colors. (Amy Newbold of Sewtopia hosts this class. And congrats to Amy as she is now setting up an actual quilt store building in addition to her online business.)

Marrakesh is pieced and is all about manipulating color for different effect. (My top needs ironing, but I won’t do that until I get ready to layer it. And to protect the exposed seams from coming apart I staystitched the edges.) Precision is the name of the game here, and I learned some new piecing and trimming tricks. Tara’s method for trimming blocks with a 45-degree angle is really good and something I did not know.

I probably should have done more with the coloring page Tara included, so that’s a lesson learned. If I were doing a bigger top, I definitely would lay out the colors first. Other class members used different backgrounds as well—both light and dark. The greys are really nice, and one person used a rich red that is just yummy.

I have enough of the pale, pale orange to bind it—I have white, too, but am hesitant about using white for binding. The orange would have to be straight cut, and I prefer bias binding, so I’m still thinking about that issue. But I have not decided. This quilt, at 45 1/2 square, would make a nice baby quilt, or a table topper, or a wall hanging. I’ll put a sleeve on it probably. And I think I’ll quilt something a bit wider than up and down 1/4-inch matchstick lines. I have to do some measuring, and I’ll use a thread that kind of disappears. Perhaps a pale grey or a pale grey-blue. Or a mixture of those. Even a pale orange in places might be nice.

This one has been fun, and Project 2 drops tomorrow. The fabric for it has arrived, and it is lusciously delicious!

I was warned that the strawberry red—the middle one—ran, so I handwashed it. And, yes it did. A lot. So, I also hand washed the darker red, the orange, and the dark blue. The dark blue and orange were fine; the darker red ran a bit. I rinsed them all in a mild vinegar solution and rinsed again to be sure.

I’ve also read elsewhere that the Kona blacks are running, so I’ll be careful with those as well.

I don’t think we need to wash many quilting fabrics today, but I do as I react to the dyes. Plus, I don’t like to wash and dry a quilt I’ve just finished. I like them all crinkly and soft, yes, but for a time I like them not crinkly. There is no right or wrong here, but people do tend to fall into one camp or the other.

Today we are getting a big storm in the early afternoon that will go through until tomorrow. We need rain, but I could do without the wind. The ground is so soft in this warm weather we are having, and high wind will bring down trees. In any case, I am all ready to go for Project 2 tomorrow!