Stitch, Fall 2011: Paper Shredder Quilt

The Fall issue of Stitch has been out for a while, but somehow I never got a chance to show any of my projects in it round these parts. No sooner had I spread my Paper Shredder Quilt out on the sofa than it was occupied by not one, but two of the local quadrupeds, eager to coat a new quilt with their abundant fur. I swear, they weren’t posed. Is it just me, or do they seem to be telling the photographer to back the eff off? Bloody ingrates.

I wanted the quilt to look like strips of paper falling from a paper shredder and gathering in a pile, and of course I love text-print fabric. I had a lot of fun making the quilt, and I think it’s one of my favorites of the projects I’ve designed for Stitch. It’s also about as close to improvisational piecing as I get—the blocks are cut apart pretty casually to insert the strips of typographic prints, but there’s still a bit of planning necessary to keep the strips lined up. There’s a method to the cultivated madness.

Quilting it was fun too, using straight lines at random angles to enhance the cut-paper effect. Some details of the quilting process are discussed on the Stitch blog, and of course the full pattern is available in the Fall issue of the magazine.

Maybe the animals weren’t mad at me so much as concerned that I’d removed their stairs to get a cleaner shot—poor Princess Fluffinstuff is stranded on the sofa without her doggy steps. Here the steps have been returned to the relief of all creatures.