Happy Friday! I have a finished quilt to share today!! This one has been done for a while (Spring 2023), but I only managed to take photographs of it last month, so here we are!
I started this quilt in late 2022 in an effort to use up some of my hand dyed indigo fabric stash. Specifically I wanted to make a quilt with all of the lawn that I had dyed over the years. I thought I would make a lot more garments with it, so I would dye a yard or two of lawn almost every time I mixed up a vat of indigo dye. In the end, I only made two garments, a tank and a beach cover up. The tank was given to a friend since I didn't wear it, and the beach cover up was way too big. So I started by harvesting the fabric from the cover up and then collecting all the dyed lawns together. I dyed a little more to have enough for a backing too. All the lawn used in this quilt is Cambridge Cotton Lawn* by Robert Kaufman, which is my favorite lawn for dyeing!
If you're interested in learning about indigo dyeing, or just seeing some of the prints I dyed for this quilt in their entirety, see this post: DIY Indigo Fabric Dyeing Tutorial
Like with most of my other indigo quilts I knew I wanted to keep the design simple. I usually stick with large pieces so you can really appreciate the fabrics. I played around with a lot of ideas but ended up deciding on a simple on point quilt. It has a bit of a woven look and uses nice big squares.
This quilt came together fast! The cutting and piecing were both quick, I remember that!
It was so fun to revisit all these fabrics. Many of them were dyed at retreats with friends, or with family and neighbors. I dyed some at cabins, in our apartment backyard, and in our backyard here in CT. I've just looked back, I've been playing around with indigo dyeing since 2013, so more than 10 years! Great times.
This is a big quilt, it finishes at 66"x88" after a run through the washer and dryer. I used Quilter's Dream Bamboo batting* (bamboo, silk, tencel and cotton blend), which is lightweight and so lovely with lawn. It makes for a quilt with beautiful drape, perfect for summer. This is my third lightweight lawn (voile) quilt, see the other two here: Little Folks Voile Summer Quilt and Liberty Lawn Giant Vintage Star Quilt.
The quilting was done by Katie of Autumn Moon Quilting, who did such a nice job. I love this "Rosemary" quilting design in her library, I'll definitely be using it again on a future quilt! Katie is really great about helping you determine the right quilting design size/density. In my opinion, for a lawn quilt this is especially important because you don't want the quilting to be too dense and compromise the texture/drape of the lawn.
The entire quilt is lawn from the top to the backing and binding. I didn't have enough of a single piece to use for the binding, so it ended up scrappy!
Between this quilt and my recent indigo baby quilt, I have greatly depleted my stash of indigo fabrics! Which just means I get to dye more!! :) I already had one dye session this summer, but I am hoping to squeeze in one more while the weather is still nice. If you've never tried it and are at all interested, I highly recommend it. Grab a friend (or two) and make a dye date!
Happy Quilting!
*Note: Any links marked with an asterisk in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click through and buy something, I make a small commission, at no extra cost to you.
