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Show Us Your Stash: BCharmer
Here’s a selection of fabrics from the “studio hovel” of Colleen MacDonald, sewer, crafter and owner of BCharmer Designs. (If this is a hovel, then my sewing room is … whatever’s messier than a hovel.) How I love that Pacific Northwest light.
She had a few words to share with us on her obsession:
My fabric stash is my treasure! I love to sit and stare at it. My stash is an ever evolving thing: I sew almost every day, so many prints diminish quickly, making it very difficult for me not to exhibit hoarding behaviour. Luckily, there are so many amazing designers that are continually coming out with new fabric lines, so I can replenish my supply with new and exciting prints.
The process of welcoming fabric into my studio is an exercise for my heart; I flutter and flap when I first meet a new piece of wonderful fabric; I can hardly wait to create with it! After I cut into it, I fold it up and put it in the stash on my shelves and admire it until the next piece calls to be made.
Catch up with her handmade life on her blog or through her etsy shop or on Flickr. Thanks, Colleen!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Join the True Up flickr pool, add your pics and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: JCasa Handmade
What’s that I spy? Let’s take a closer look.
OH MY LANDS IT’S A FABRIC STASH.
The lovely and talented Jennifer Casa of JCasa Handmade gives us a quick tour of her stash. Look at those colors!
I want to just take a bite of those reds and oranges!
That’s … weird, isn’t it. I should probably have breakfast before I write these things.
All right! Well, before I frighten any future contributors (I SWEAR I DON’T ACTUALLY BITE) I’d like to thank J Casa for the peek. Visit her blog here, or her flickr stream, or her shop. Thanks, Jennifer!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Join the True Up flickr pool, add your pics and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: Vintage Edition
Stash time! Hold on to your hats: It’s the vintage edition.
This photo is from Susie at Flower Press:
This photo shows part of my fabric collection and all the different types of fabric I have in it, from hand printed pieces by myself and other indie designers through vintage pieces such as bark cloth and 60s tea towels and pillowcases and on to popular quilting fabric designers like Amy Butler and Erin McMorris.
I’m getting better at using my stash, though I am quite happy to just admire it piled up like this
Recently I used some of these pieces in my first quilt (the perfect stash project!).
These vintage French fabrics are from petits details (her blog is here):
I grew up in the U.S. and moved to France almost ten years ago (my husband is French). I love all things vintage, especially textiles, and these are some favorite old French fabrics from my stash. There’s something about the look and feel of them that is so irresistible and I often wonder where they were originally sold and where they’ve been over the years.
Here’s a lovely assortment from Beth (flickr user wee pereas):
I love all the little bits of vintage fabric scraps, just waiting to be combined and reused in some fun pouches, patchwork and such!
I have actually used some of those already to line bags, make pouches, line baskets with.. just love the idea of using vintage and upcycling!
Finally, Hillary Lang of Wee Wonderfuls happened on an estate sale:
Tim and I always drive by estate sales and sigh a wistful sigh and then just keep driving because we have the kids in tow. That kind of sale is way too cut throat to bring a 2 and 5 year old into. But this weekend we saw one that didn’t look too crowded and we were feeling brave so we stopped and I’m so glad we did.
Thanks to all the stashers who were kind enough to share their words and images in this post!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Drop your pics in the True Up flickr pool and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: Skinny LaMinx
Heather Moore, aka Skinny LaMinx, gave a peek at her vintage fabric stash beautifully stored in two glass-fronted cabinets. Oh, the beauty, concentrated all in one place. I love storage that puts the fabric on display.
Here are a few words from Heather:
I’m so pleased to have my stash in plain view at last, after all these years of collecting. I love to visit car boot sales, which is where I’ve picked up just about all my vintage fabrics. Even though I generally don’t generally have an idea in mind for how to use it, I’ve got some kind of “rescue” mentality going on, where I want to take the beautiful fabric home, where it will be appreciated! Until I got my new (to me) cabinets, I wasn’t really appreciating my stash as it was all hidden away in a crate, but now it’s there on full view for all to enjoy. And who knows, I might even be brave enough to actually use my fabrics to make something!
Thanks for sharing, Heather! Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Drop your pics in the True Up flickr pool and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: Needle Book’s Craft Studio
Take a gander at the light-filled, enviable studio of Claire Louise Milne, of needle book blog.
Love that old Bernina, and especially love that fabric cabinet arranged chromologically. For more by Claire, see her blog or her etsy shop. Thanks, Claire!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Drop your pics in the True Up flickr pool and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: Red Pepper Quilts
Rita of Red Pepper Quilts shared a pretty varied assortment of fabrics on her blog, saying,
I really would like to make a quilt with fabrics that are designed by vastly different designers. I have gathered together some Amy Butler, Kaffe Fassett, and Valori Wells, but also some classic stripes, toile, Echino double gauze by Etsuko Furuya, and Mrs March 1930’s collection.
Some of these fabrics are way out of my comfort zone, and I am not even sure if they will all work well together. I am surely going to give it my best shot.
Check them out.
She says she’s just finished cutting the featured fabrics in the photos and will be sewing the quilt top over the next few days. Can’t wait to see how it turns out!
Thanks, Rita!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Drop your pics in the True Up flickr pool and tag them “stash.”
Show Us Your Stash: Stash With Still Life
Because they’re pretty, that’s why. (Was there even a question? Probably not.)
This week’s edition: Fabric Next To Stuff (but Still Life sounds artier).
This gorgeous combination is from Flickr user Saidos da Concha. Says Constança,
When I saw these peonies and freesias at the local florist I immediately thought of my pink fabrics! So I bought a few flowers and, as soon as I arrived home, I arranged them in my favourite enamel pitcher. I grabbed my fabrics and my husband’s camera and started shooting!
Kellie marmys on flickr) writes of her stacks of solids:
I keep my stash in a glass-doored armoire (along with my handpainted sock yarn stash) because I get almost as much pleasure from just looking at the fabulous colours of my fabrics and yarns as I do from creating with them. I love to add solids to my projects to compliment the wonderfully complex and often richly coloured contemporary quilting fabrics available today. I keep them separate from the prints to make pulling various shades/tones of a particular solid for ‘matching’ quicker and easier.
Sparrow of Host of Sparrows writes about her immaculately folded collection:
After moving into my latest apartment I spent what may seem like an embarrassing amount of time in my art / craft / sewing / computer room (merging is a necessity in a two bedroom apartment occupied by a girl with too many interests, not to mention the upcoming addition of a fiancé into the mix too!) in front of the ironing board making painstakingly sure that the folded bundles of color coordinated fabric were all the same width and length, but I’m so glad that I did! Even after multiple trips back and forth to the stash weeding thru and pulling out random possibilities, all the fabric has continually settled back into the same happy piles of uniformity that helps to keep my crafting brain organized!
And Emily (Zayneegirl on flickr) of Emily’s Little World wrote about her “little stack of joy”:
In the middle of a gloomy February, I went to the cheap section of one of the last WalMart fabric sections in my town and indulged in a huge purchase of clearance fabric for an upcoming project. I loved picking colors and patterns that wouldn’t normally “go together” and watching the pile grow as my saleslady cut each bolt.
The final calling for most of this fabric? Spool’s fabric birds, found here
Thanks, stashers!
Be part of the ongoing Show Us Your Stash series! Drop your pics in the True Up flickr pool and tag them “stash.”
Happy Mail Week
My fabric order from Bolt 44 (previous post). Love! It feels like very good quality fabric. I’m thinking PJ pants for me, toddler clothes, and quilt backs.
10 Tips for Building a More Color-Rich Stash, by Color Mastery Author Maria Peagler
Today True Up is hosting the second stop of author/quilter Maria Peagler’s “blog tour.” The tour began yesterday on Whip Up with a video — follow her tomorrow to Quilter’s Buzz. See the rest of the tour stops here. Welcome, Maria!
Hi Kim and thanks for hosting me at True Up for the second stop in my Color Mastery blog tour, a first for a quilting book author. I’m excited to be here to talk to True Up readers about how to build a more versatile and color-rich stash. I’ve just finished the ultimate stash project: a book on color for quilters, with all 13 quilts in the book made from my stash.
First, why just fabrics from my stash? I gave myself the artistic limitation for two reasons: 1) It was a great creative spark. The worst thing you can do to an artist is to say, “make whatever you want.” Too broad. Limiting yourself actually makes you more creative. 2) I knew if I could achieve stunning results with a limited selection of stash fabrics, any quilter could read the book, do the exercises, and successfully select fabrics in a quilt shop, where the selection was far more diverse. Basically, I had to prove myself.
Here are two quilts from Color Mastery that started out with the same fabrics, but resulted in quilts with divergent looks. Round Up Star, the quilt on the left, was inspired by an old cowboy sign I saw in a magazine. The colors were dull, dusty hues you would see on the range, so I replicated those in the quilt. I then took the scraps and used a completely different color palette to make Bunkhouse Scraps, the quilt on the right. I added only three brighter fabrics for a scrap quilt with lots of energy.
So how was I able to get stunning results with just my stash fabrics? I shop carefully, not impulsively, filling in the gaps in my stash. I want my stash to be my own color palette, just waiting to be made into my next quilt, whatever it may be. But that requires a strategy. So here are my Top Ten Tips for Building a More Color-Rich Fabric Stash:
- Know your stash. Create color wheels from your stash to discover what fabrics are plentiful and those that are missing from your stash. This is a great artistic exercise, and even if you are a traditional quilter, really opens your eyes to the world of color and what you gravitate toward.
- Shop for a variety of values and intensities as much as you do for color. Look for lights, darks, brights, and dulls as much as you do for the colors that appeal to your heart. Most of the fabrics available in a shop, whether online or brick and mortar, are medium values. I shop as much for value as I do for hue.
- Select fabric you can use in multiple ways. Marbled solids, batiks, checks, plaids, stripes, ethnic prints, and large prints are versatile and can fill many purposes in a quilt. They are equally at home in a pieced quilt, appliqué, borders, and bindings. I love novelty prints as much as any quilter, but find I use them once and the leftovers sit unused in my stash.
- Frequent a variety of fabric shops. Certainly be loyal to your favorite quilt shop, but realize no one store has everything. Fill in the gaps in your stash by shopping regionally, by mail-order, when on vacation, and online.
- Swap fabrics with friends. Some of the most versatile fabrics I own came from friends’ stashes. They saw the potential in fabrics I would have passed by. And I was happy to own fabrics from quilters who had no idea how to use them. Swapped fabrics can be great rut-busters. Look for fabric swaps online or at your local quilt guild.
- Encourage family and friends to wrap birthday and holiday gifts in fabric. My husband and children do this for me and I’m delighted by the bonus of receiving this extra gift on special days in my life. Plus, it really takes yardage to wrap a gift, rather than a tiny fat quarter.
- Turn your challenges into opportunities. You don’t need an enormous stash to make stunning quilts if you follow the ten principles outlined in Color Mastery. I live in a rural mountain area with limited fabric shopping venues, yet I still manage to make an eclectic variety of gorgeous quilts with ordinary fabrics. And the additional limitation of using only stash fabrics for the quilt projects in my book forced me to be far more creative than if I had just bought a pre-packaged kit.
- Buy long. I heard Mary Ellen Hopkins say this at one of her famously funny lectures, and I’ve never regretted her advice. If you love a fabric, you’ll find multiple ways of using it over and over again.
- Discover Fantastic Bolts on the Sale Rack. I can’t stress this tip enough. Many of the unique fabrics I buy at full retail price eventually end up on sale simply because many quilters are unsure of what to do with them. I’ve also snapped up yards of extraordinary fabrics from sale racks. Just because someone else doesn’t see potential in a piece of fabric doesn’t mean it’s not there. Look again, especially after you’ve mastered using the color wheel.
- Cultivate a Relationship with Shop Owners. Get to know your favorite shop owner and tell her what you’re looking for and willing to buy. The most profitable shops carry fabrics that move quickly; the key to staying in business is constantly offering a new selection of fabrics that keep quilters coming back. Let shop owners know you want fabrics that span a variety of color elements (lights, darks, brights, and dulls) and then be sure to buy them when the shop begins carrying them.
Use these tips to design your own strategy when you visit your favorite fabric shop – whether online or in person. I didn’t stop buying fabrics to use more of my stash; instead, I identified the areas in my stash where I had gaps and bought those fabrics so I could be more effective in my quilts.
The best place to find Color Mastery: 10 Principles for Creating Stunning Quilts, is at your local quilt shop. If they don’t carry it, you can also buy at Atlasbooks.com (my secure distributor) or Amazon. As a special to True Up readers, if you buy from Atlasbooks.com, enter TrueUp in the Special Instructions order field and you’ll get free Priority Mail shipping. Order the book today and you could have it by Thursday!
Holiday Fabric Roundup and Show Us Your Stash Collide!
This dreamy Christmas color story is from Brooke, whose new blog Inchmark should be on your must-read list. When I asked for permission to post she not only said yes but offered to ID the fabrics for us! So this is a value-added post. All fabrics are from Purl Patchwork; not all are currently available.
I’ve been trying to think of a way to archive/display vintage fabrics. Something like this in a frame or shadow box is just the ticket. Thank you so much, Brooke!
top row:
1. Moda – Joelle Hoverson – Cake Rock Beach – Leaf Honeycomb
2. Yuwa – Sweet Dots – Pink
3. Moda – Joelle Hoverson – Net of Jewels – Gaspeite
second row:
1. Robert Kaufman – Essex – Linen/cotton blend (not sure which color)
2. Yuwa – Live Life – Lime Stripes
3. Yuwa – Honeycomb – Red 108
third row:
1. Windham – Rhapsody – Green Rhapsody Dot
2. an old Anna Griffin (Windham) — no longer in stock
3. not sure…. but could be P+B’s Blush?
fourth row:
1. Lecien – Skinny Stripes – Red
2. Girlfriends “Meghan” by Jennifer Paganelli – Sisboom for Freespirit (out of print but might be for sale somewhere)
3. Robert Kaufman – Primatex Basics – Willow Dots
Show Us Your Stash: Reference Library
I love Reference Library because it’s the one design blog that never makes me feel wanty or overwhelmed. Plus he has a special affinity for vintage fabric and textiles. Andy shared some of his wife Erin’s stash of amazing vintage fabrics (photos are by Erin). See them all together here.
Ooh look, a colorway reunion.
Thanks, Erin and Andy!
Show Us Your Stash: “Simple”
I love these fabrics and this composition from Allison of Six and a Half Stitches, posted about here.
Show Us Your Stash: Colorful and Scrappy
Claire of Needlebook is making an orange and lavender Single Girl quilt.
Shanna of Pink Trees will be making her contribution to the Doll Quilt Swap 5 with these fabrics.
A lovely bunch of flea market scraps from Sweet Jessie.
Show Us Your Stash: Stacks Edition
Anita of Bloomin’ Workshop shared this “stack of fats”, which will become a Kaffe Fassett Leafy Rosy quilt from the book Glorious Patchwork.
Moxie-Girl posted this stack of vintage fabric in the True Up Flickr Pool.
And I also love this stack of simple but versatile fabrics from elsiemarley; it’s in the pool too.
Martha’s Stash
before
after
Martha Stewart wrote a post about her stash organization project on The Martha Blog. She wrapped the fabrics, many of them antique, in acid-free paper and cellophane to protect them from the elements.
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