Today’s Topic: How to Quilt a Medallion Whole Cloth Quilt
Welcome to Week Twenty of The Better Machine Quilt-a-long based on my book 25 Days to Better Machine Quilting.
Find all of the previous Lessons HERE.
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Good Morning, Quilters!
Today, we are going to create a basic medallion whole cloth quilt. A medallion quilt has a central motif-in this case a filled square–surrounded by several borders.
This project allows us to practice using a stencil as well as travel techniques-as well as other techniques we’ve learned so far such as marking, starching the backing, creating a quilt sandwich.
Create a Quilt Sandwich
Begin with your favorite color solid fabric on top.
Layer it with a batting you’ve never tried before.
Add a backing fabric.
Baste the layers by pressing, or try spray or pin basting.
Spray starch and press the backing fabric, if you found it helped the quilt glide better while stitching.
Mark the Quilt Top
Mark a square in the center of the fabric. I recommend marking an 8 inch square, but smaller or larger will work. (Use any square ruler you have to make it easy!)
Fill the square with a one inch grid. Use a stencil if available, or a ruler.
(When drawing straight lines, I love the Clover Chalk Wheel-white only.)
Add a 1/2 inch border around the center square and a 5 inch border around the small border.
Set Up Your Machine
Gentle reminder (as in, note to self)–when is the last time you cleaned your machine and/or changed the needle?
Prepare your machine for free motion quilting with a heavy weight thread on top and a lightweight thread in the bobbin.
Quilt the Grid
Fill the grid with your favorite grid motif. Some of my favorites are
Orange Peel (Woven Cross Hatch)
Stitch the Borders
NOTE-In the purple quilt above, I used a machine guided technique (feed dogs engaged, regular stitching foot) to stitch the borders. In the blue quilt below, I free motion stitched a double zig zag to create the borders. Choose your favorite option.
Stitch a slightly wavy line around the border surrounding the grid. Closely echo stitch this line.
Knot off to travel.
Stitch the line 1/2 inch away. Stitch a wavy line and closely echo stitch the line.
Knot off to travel.
Stitch a wavy line around the outer border and add echostitching.
Knot off to travel.
Fill the Large Border
Fill the large border with your favorite fill design.
Flower Power and Starry Night are two of my favorites.
Travel While Stitching
This small area will probably afford several “opportunities” for travel stitching. (Review Travel Stitching for Machine Quilters HERE).
Try echo stitching, retracing and adding a loopy line, but force yourself to avoid knotting off.
Work in Series
After you create the first medallion quilt, create a second and a third quilt. Replace the grid motif with another grid pattern and fill the wide border with a new motif. Try a new thread or batting.
Or add a wide border to a pieced block in your collection and stitch a grid over it with a Flower Power border.
Of course, the options are endless!
What About YOU?
Were YOU able to travel without knotting off?
How does echo stitching effect the overall look of your quilting?
Did you try retracing? Do you think thread weight affects the look of retracing?
We’d LOVE to hear!
YOUR Travel Agent of Quilting,
Lori
PS…All tutorials, images and information are the property of Lori Kennedy Quilts and are intended for personal use only. Feel free to re-blog, pin or share with attribution to LKQ. For all other purposes, please contact me at Lori@LoriKennedyQuilts.com. Thank you!
Visit my Etsy shop: LoriKennedyShop for all of my books! They are ALL bestsellers!
11 comments
worldpresscom986
to Arvilla Trag: Bless you for quilting for others. I’ll bet you find a lot of satisfaction in feeling you have helped someone. You’ll feel good for rewarding yourself, but not as good as you feel giving love to others via quilting.
again God Bless you
Susan Geldmeier
Lori, I have a question about the grid pop.
Why do you sew 2 lines of straight stitches before filling in 1/2 the squares with lines?
If I mark the grid in 1 “ increments on a predetermined size, won’t this throw off one line and make the squares slightly smaller along that line?
Lori Kennedy Quilts
That is just one way to fill it in. You don’t have to do two lines and I usually don’t!
Arvilla Trag
Renee – the only caution I would offer on such a material is that they have a tendency to fray quite badly. I recently made a wallet out of a silk brocade, and the fraying was quite severe. I ultimately dabbed Fray Block along all the edges. For the next one I may try an overcast stitch along the edges.
Renee Michelle Tye
does the quilt material have to be cotton i am wanting to have a more shining and silk like material what would be the best for that type of material thank you Renee
WordPress.com Support
Try it! I’m sure it will look great with any material!
Arvilla Trag
Lori, you’re killing me here! I have so much to do before I have time to “play” and this lesson is seriously making me want to play! I have always loved the entire idea of whole cloth quilts, especially when using a variety of thread colors. A couple of quilt shows ago I bought a collection of rainbow-colored Wonderfil threads with the specific idea of making a whole cloth quilt out of black fabric, using all the thread colors, then doing the same thing with white fabric and making a throw pillow out of the two pieces. To quote Shrek “It’s on mah to-do list!”
I also have a question – in one of your lessons the first photo was of a Christmas tree made of wrapped gifts. To my disappointment, the lesson showed how to do several other Christmas-themed motifs, but not that particular one. Where can I find your instructions on that Christmas tree? I could re-invent the wheel, but I thought I would ask you first. I have about 6 more small-ish projects to complete as Christmas gifts, and that motif is the perfect one for at least two of them. Thank you!
WordPress.com Support
Hi Arvilla! I do not have a tutorial for the Xmas tree with the packages. Though there is a tutorial for the presents. https://lorikennedyquilts.com/the-pretty-packages-free-motion-quilt-tutorial/
Arvilla Trag
Perfect! Thank you!
Terri B.
Hi. I had the same problem as you: too many things to do and never get to quilting. I don’t know if this will help, but here’s what I finally found. I put my quilting right at the beginning of the day. The advantages: you get some quilting done and you start out the day with a happy beginning. After quilting, then I did “business:” which in my language is cleaning, running errands, etc. I read a book that taught this principle. The author challenged readers to quilt 15 min. a day, for a week. It was surprising what people said they accomplished. From that point, I realized that what I love to do and what centers me (therapy), is quilting. So, why not do it first. You can decide any amount of time, but give it a try!
Arvilla Trag
LOL, I already have my time divided. I work in my office from 6 to 2, then quilt from 2 to 4. The current issue is that I have so much Christmas quilting to do (lots of it for elderly widows in Louisiana who lost everything in the hurricanes) that I don’t have time to just play with quilting. In the last week I have started and finished 1 wallet, 1 wall hanging with Christmas lights, and 1 table runner. I still have in the queue 1 elaborate tote, 1 more table runner, and 4 more wall hangings. Every year about this time I swear that next year I will make things for myself. I’ve been doing that for as many years as I can remember, and it hasn’t happened yet.
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