Color Doesn’t Matter

Download materials list here

“Color Doesn’t Matter” is a two-day class in which students will create a pattern from their own photograph.  They will make a quilt with their pattern, learning an easy fused raw-edge appliqué technique.  Quilts can be any subject including portraits of people or pets, landscapes, buildings or mechanical objects.

Taking a Photo for “Color Doesn’t Matter”

My college photography teacher told us the best photos should be taken on a cloudy day, or in subdued light.  For the purpose of our class, we want to do exactly the opposite.  Take a photo of your subject, whether it’s an old truck, a pile of tools or a portrait, in bright light.  Full sunshine is great.  You want your photo to have a wide range of values from dark to light.  Take several photos from different angles.  Try to have your subject fill the frame.  If you are doing a portrait, make it a close-up of the head.  If you are doing a truck or tools, consider a close-up of a portion of your subject.  Perhaps have just the hood and bumper of a vehicle or a few hammerheads in the picture.

Bring two or three different photos (or more if you like) and we can discuss which one will work for you. 

In my classes, I have had people make quilts of machines, trucks, flowers, lighthouses, pets and children.  There is no limit to what you can use to make a pattern for your Color Doesn’t Matter Quilt.

Lynne Pillus

Lynne Pillus has been a quilter for thirty years.  She started, as many of us have, the old fashioned way – with templates and a needle and thread, hand piecing her first quilt.  When the quilt shop opened nearby, and classes offered in rotary cutting and strip piecing, she was there.

Lynne has taken many classes since then and enjoyed many retreats.  She has tried many new techniques, unusual fabrics, and interesting combinations, all in a search to find her own voice.

Then Lynne, who lives in the farm community of Oroville, went on a Farm City Tour at CSU Chico.  She took a photo of a piece of farm equipment, printed it out, and wondered if it was possible to reproduce that feeling of depth and motion in fabric into a quilt.  It was.  Hence, she has become known as the “mechanical quilter.”