Herb Garden Quilt

I have learnt recently that Makower have commissioned Anja Townrow to design a patchwork quilt using fabrics from my “Herb Garden” Collection. It is always a great thrill for me to see how others have used my fabric designs to create their own unique works of art. I am not much of a quilter myself, although I have managed to finish a few small projects, so I have been really interested to see how Anja has realized her design.

If you feel inspired to create your own quilt you can have the pattern absolutely free of charge by following the link in my sidebar or by going to the Makower website. There you will find instructions and information about sewing the quilt, if you do not have the time to do the whole quilt it might be nice to make a smaller cushion using part of the pattern?

Anja is a professional quilter with her own website called Dutch Quilts. She was born in Holland and has lived in England since the seventies when she started to make quilts after being inspired by a picture in a magazine. I am sure Anja’s work will in turn inspire others as her work is regularly featured in exhibitions and publications. The website is well worth a visit, there is a gallery of quilts, information about books, workshops and free patterns.

The fabric designs are in the Makower warehouse now and are ready to ship so should be available this month. I have samples here and am delighted by the quality of the printing by the craftsmen in South Korea who have the seemingly impossible task of registering as many as eighteen different screens without loosing definition. I think my favourite design is the blue botanical design, which Anja has used in her teapot appliqué, in fact teapots feature quite a lot in this collection, it must be something to do with living near to Stoke-on-Trent!

Herb Garden Collection

At the moment I am busy working on a new collection of fabric designs for Makower UK. Unfortunately I can't show you these designs at the moment because of copyright protection. I can however show you my "Herb Garden" Collection which will make it's debut at the quilt market in Houston this month. It seems ages since I delivered the final artwork to the Makower headquarters in Henley-on-Thames, most people are surprised that a fabric design actually starts life as a painted piece of paper.

Today I saw it for the first time in print, always an anxious moment. Unlike an illustration for a print reproduction on paper, these fabric designs have to be translated into separate screens, one screen per colour. When you consider that some of the designs contain eighteen different colours, you can imagine the skill of the printer who has to perfectly register each and every colour.

Here are two of my favourite designs from the collection, I hope you like them!

I used some of the images from this collection to make my one of my little artist's books. These designs form a decorative panel called a nine square or label design. A term which will be familiar to those of you who quilt. You can see more of these images in my "Herb Garden" miniature book in my Etsy shop.