Blue Odyssey Quilt

When I first launched Shannon Fraser Designs, I promised you I would not only share projects and updates, but milestones as well. And this project perfectly fits the latter: this is the story of my first custom quilt experience!

This quilt is really special to me. Not only because it was my first custom quilt, but one I got to design with very little parameters from the client. Thrilling and nerve-wracking all at the same time!

It all started when a client approached me for a custom quilt. They wanted a blanket for their main living room sofa and their only requests were for it to be blue and geometric.  Other than that, the remaining design elements were left up to me.

It’s such an honour to have someone love my work so much that they would trust me implicitly to create an heirloom quilt for them, without seeing the proposed design! That’s trust!! 

I decided to do a study in blues, with a focus on turquoise and darker blues as those are the client's favourites. I designed the quilt based on half square triangles (HST) as I wanted to see how the blues played off one another and how their colours changed depending on how they are paired.  The quilt truly became a study in blues!

Quilts are a labour of love and while the design is not complex, the preparation and piecing of the quilt top requires precision and patience.  The patience really factors in when squaring up the HSTs.  There’s well over a 100 of them and a good chunk of time was dedicated to getting them nice and square. 

I hummed and hawed for a little while over the thread choice; ultimately deciding on Aurifil #1125 Medium Teal which matched the back perfectly! It was also a great complimentary colour with all the other blues featured in the quilt.  Plus, I loved the prominence of the stitch created by the 40wt (which was a first for me). 

The best part was delivering the quilt and seeing my client’s reaction. Then being told it was even better than she had imagined it would be! Best. Moment. Ever.

The response to my Blue Odyssey quilt has been amazing and so I’ve been working behind the scenes to turn this quilt into my first pattern.  Stay tuned all my HST lovers!!

xo

Shannon

P.S. This was one of the projects that was part of my Q2 Finish-A-Long.

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