English Paper Piecing: Prepping

In between dizziness and watching the Olympics I have been working on a couple of English paper piecing projects whilst cheering on gymnasts, cyclists, rowers and the like.  A huge thankyou to all the supportive emails I got about labyrinthitis. I am not as spinny as last week but still hopeless on transport so I think recovery will be a gradual progress, and an extra big thankyou to Fiona for her very helpful email.  EPP is the perfect holiday project, easy to transport, compact and good to do sitting anywhere.  Graph  paper and custom shapes are available for free here but despite my often thrifty ways I would recommend Paper Pieces over that, great quality paper, reusable and mine arrived from USA in under a week.  Check out the discount code at Katy's blog- still useable until the end of August.

Buying Brigitte Giblin's book changed the way I view EPP.  I am working on a Medallion for my Brit Quilt partner and Tessellations II for me.  I thought I would share some of my prep for cutting and sticking- I use glue rather than basting to get my shapes ready and the only glue I would recommend is Sewline- fantastic stuff!  Brigitte captivated me with her fussy cuts.  I love fussy cutting, even though it is wasteful is is waste worth having!  To fussy cut the squares I used washi tape to create a viewing window on my quilt ruler.

For the triangles, diamonds and hexagons, I drew cutting templates on template plastic the size of the shapes plus 1/2" seam allowance.  I know this is generous but Brigitte recommends increasing seam allowance as the side lengths increase.  These shapes have 2 1/2" finished side length and a larger SA makes them easier to work with.  I use a Sewline fabric pencil to draw round the template, it is softer with a lot less drag than a standard pencil and can be removed from the fabric too.  Then I rotary or scissor cut the shapes.  The clear grid templates allow for fussy cutting too.

For the gluing stage, I work my way anti clockwise around the shapes and stick to that on all the shapes which makes them fit together better as the dog ears snuggle up and behave.   It doesn't matter if you go clockwise or anticlockwise but once you pick a direction, stay the same for all your shapes.  I start with a mini cross in the centre of the paper just to hold it in place on the fabric.

Then, I run the glue pen along about 2/3rds of the way along one side,

 And using a long pin to tuck the fabric over and allow for a bit of room for the stitches, I press the fabric down.  If you fold the fabric round the paper too tightly you will end up stitching through the paper itself which will blunt your needle, that pin adds a little ease.

The next stripe of glue goes right along an edge including over the fabric at one corner.  Use the pin again to get a neat corner and fold.

And repeat until the shape is complete. The dog ears are flapping away and I find the other shapes interlock and sit on them so they act like little shelves and are rather helpful!

I bought a new cutting mat for this project as my previous one was shredded and blunting my rotary cutters.  Following a recommendation on Instagram from Christina I plumped for an Omnigrid and was amazed at the difference in cutting- marks actually healed and my blades don't immediately loose their sharpness.

I am going for a change in colours with the Tessellation's Quilt away from my usual colour palettes.

 So far the centre rosette is complete and I have cut out the fabric for the next stage.  It is a slow grower, but very satisfying.

You can find more English paper piecing help here with Katy in her Hexy MF quilt-a-long for Fat Quarterly, here with Lynne and here with Florence.  All are well worth a visit for help, tips and inspiration.

Investment

I heard about this on Twitter from Katy and as soon as I saw a picture I was smitten.  I held back form an immediate purchase just in case it was a passing fad but no, it kept creeping back in to my mental library of quilt images.  It is expensive, imported and then sent via Europe but it is worth every single penny.  Sometimes a book comes along which changes your creative ideas- I remember buying Suzuko Koseki's Machine Made Patchworks- now Patchwork Style and it changed so much for me.   This book is in the same catergory.

 Brigitte Giblin is a talented quilter who was born in France and lives in Australia.  This combination has created a beautiful chateau/Ayer's rock colour scheme that runs through all her quilts and astounds me every time I look at it.  Many of the quilts are english paper pieced but there is machine piecing and foundation and there is constant inspiration.   The photographs are stunning, quilting eye candy everywhere. When I sit and browse this book, my husband cranes his neck over too and comments on how much he likes the quilts.  This is not a normal occurrence!  We were both drawn to 'Dancing Dollies'.  The organic pieced and appliques shapes reminded us of the geometry found in sea shells and a vintage book full of similar pictures.

I already know that I have to make this beauty, Tessellations II.  I have some larger floral prints and a colour palette of jewel like prints.  I am going to attempt to machine piece this- we'll see how that goes- but it will mean constant Y seams.  I am not usually a big fan of hexagons but this book, along with Tasha's Hexa-go-go is changing that.  I am seeing them differently and I am also look at large florals- Martha Negley, Kaffe Fassett and Philip Jacobs and wanting to add these to my stash.

And for my Brit quilt partner, I am sorry but I feel compelled to do this centre circle medallion whether my partner likes it or not.  Finger's crossed that she will...

You can buy the book here.

Brigitte's website is here

And Brigitte's blog is here.  I have already contacted her with a query and she is quick to respond and very helpful.  There are also tips and pointers for the quilts and techniques.

You will not regret it.