MY INSPIRATION FOR THIS WORK
It definitely is time to celebrate! This is a new space for me to blog and inspire you with ideas to create and, if you are a quilter, to quilt! Welcome to everyone!
I designed and created this work for the celebration of the thirtieth birthday celebration of the South African Quilters Guild in 2019. It was the national quilt festival, and the SAQG organized an exhibition of a number of these entries and it was spectacular! As it was a celebration, the song, Celebration Time of Kool and the Gang, kept playing in my mind and the work received its name!
HOW I DESIGNED CELEBRATION TIME!
Thinking about celebrating something, one tends to think of lots of colours. However, the challenge was to use the colours in the SAQG’slogo only. My thoughts went to fireworks immediately and I designed the work according to that. Five colours, red, blue, green, yellow and white were used to embroider the fireworks and these were done on the sixth colour, black.
TO CREATE YOUR CELEBRATION TIME! YOU WILL NEED
35cm x35cm royal blue synthetic felt
30cm x30cm black organza
2 x 35cm X 35cm Loomtex batting
30cm x30cm black backing fabric
Angelina fibres
Shiny organza confetti
Machine embroidery threads in black, blue, yellow, red, green and white
2,5m blue metallic cord
A heat gun
Sewing machine of which feed dogs can drop
Layer the Loomtex and blue felt.
Sprinkle the shiny organza confetti on top
Spread the Angelinafibres over all the above and lastly, put the black organza on top.
Use the black machine embroidery thread and meander over everything to create the background fabric.
Thread the machine with any one of the machine embroidery threads and free motion embroider radiating straight lines from a centre point in different areas on the background fabric. Repeat this with the different colours and enhance with yellow and white to represent fireworks.
Use the heat gun to burn the edges of the felt.
Pin the false backing onto the wrong side, folding all raw edges in.
Machine couch the metallic cord in place on the right side, catching the false backing in the border stitches.
Quilt a couple of lines in line with the fireworks.
Sew a hanging sleeve and label on the back of your work and enjoy your own quilted fireworks wall-hanging!
If you are passionate about textiles and want to learn more about how to incorporate my innovative techniques into your work, follow me on Instagram @tillydeharde and Facebook,Tilly de Harde Fibre Artist & Teacher and visit my website www.tillydeharde.com & subscribe to my mailing list.