Thursday, May 21, 2020

Rainbow Road

Rainbow Road, pattern (originally called Prism) and fabric by Alison Glass, is actually a very old quilt top lying in my stash. I've wanted to quilt it for a long time, but I kept putting it off because it is the scariest type of quilt to deal with: the negative space quilt. Negative space quilts offer infinite potential, and also infinite chances to not reach that potential.

As far back as a few years ago, I already had a story and a plan for this quilt. I imagined a futuristic steampunk city with a lot of paths criss-crossing in the air, and at the top of it all was a rainbow road, a (somewhat unreachable) holy grail for the citizens of the city.

To give the quilt a feeling of depth, I quilted a lot of roads that criss-cross in the air, representing a top-down view of the city.

Since the theme is inspired by steampunk, on the background areas between the paths I quilted a lot of gear type motifs. Whether or not it actually invoked a feeling of steampunk, I cannot say, but I love the look!

The rainbow road itself is quilted with a dot-to-dot design that I sort of made up as I went along. I really like how it allows the beautiful rainbow fabrics to pop up.

Rainbow Road isn't my first paths-in-the-air quilt, as I previously quilted Skyways with a similar idea. But Skyways represents a happy futuristic city set in the clouds with flowers and greenery beneath, while Rainbow Road is definitely grittier.

I love the front of this quilt, but I might love the back even more. This is truly a double-sided quilt, and you can really see the details on the back.

I'm so very happy with this quilt because of the story and how it came out pretty much as I envisioned it. It was almost 3 years in the planning, but the end result is so very special to me!

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Linking up with: My Quilt Infatuation, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Powered by Quilting, and Meadow Mist Designs.

13 comments:

  1. Having a story to help plan the quilting is ingenious. I think that many people struggle with what to do with a lot of negative space in a quilt, and I love that you turned it into a story telling opportunity. I think the gears turned out really well!

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  2. Just an amazing way to manage all that space...a story that yields a quilting plan. Genius!

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  3. Your quilting is just jaw-dropping!!!! Outstanding!!!!!!

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  4. I love the idea--looking down on a rainbow street/city! You did a great job portraying that, Liz! You sure know how to embrace the negative space.

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  5. What a great story and you brought it to the quilt beautifully! I love it, Liz. The dimensional effect of the rainbow road and the steampunk highlights are so cool. I gasped when I saw the effect on the back of the quilt - amazing! What a great finish!

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  6. I love the little gears so much! And I didn't notice the brick design on the front, but it really pops on the back. So cool! Definitely has a steampunk vibe :)

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  7. Great story behind the quilt, and beautiful quilting! The back is wonderful too!

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  8. This quilt is amazing! I hope you're going to enter it into a quilt show or contest (when we start having them again)! It deserves to be seen by a wide audience.

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  9. Love the story and your beautiful quilting! An amazing finish!

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  10. Awesome quilting design. I really like how you broke the negative space down into sections.

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  11. Lovely & the quilting is unbelievable.

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  12. This is so cool, Liz! I love the concept behind your quilting design and you totally nailed it. The steampunk gear filler is really interesting and unique. I'd love to see a tutorial for that if you ever felt like posting one, hint hint, nudge nudge... Also, two questions: One of your "road" designs appears to be just closely spaced straight lines from the right side of the quilt, but from the back side I noticed that you have short diagonal lines scattered through the straight line quilting. I'm wondering how you planned and stitched that element of the design -- did you mark those little diagonal lines ahead of time? Also, I noticed that the background quilting design is MUCH easier to see on the back of the quilt than on the front. Are you using a charcoal grey blending thread in the needle and a bright white contrasting bobbin thread? What kind of thread or threads did you use for this quilt? Congratulations on an amazing finish, a long time in the making!

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