When I left you on Tuesday, all of the interior blocks were finished…..
….and it was time to think about the borders.
My initial thought was that I didn’t want anything complicated. I felt that it needed to be simple to not detract from the interior.
First thought was to simply use dark squares…..
NO….that looks horrible. They are too heavy for the rest of the quilt.
What if I make a checkerboard…..
Better, but still not right!
I started playing with triangles and came up with this idea….
OKAY……I sort of like that!!
But I felt that the background fabric was still a bit too dark. What if I make it lighter…..
NOW I am getting somewhere!!!
BUT…..of course there is a but…. I didn’t have enough of this fabric to piece the border!! SIGH!!
What happens if I use the slightly darker fabric inside the triangles….
THAT WILL WORK!!!
By this point, I had reorganized my 2.5-inch squares and sorted them by color……
….so I didn’t really want to jumble them up again.
Instead, I picked the colors that I wanted to work with and pulled out the exact number of squares that I needed for the border…..
It didn’t take long for me to have the half-square triangles made…..
…. and the border strips pieced together…..
They look really good don’t they!!!
There was one last decision to be made……
I have asked two different groups and gotten completely different answers….
What do you think??
.
Yes for red! Even if it is a very small strip, I think it adds to the fun while containing the action inside the quilt. I think it makes it easier for the eye to see the movement of the top before add the last border, which is also grand.
Thanks Diane. I am leaning toward including it but a lot of people don’t like it!!
Hey Frances,
I usually like borders. They give the quilt an end/finish feeling. However in this quilt , I think the red border takes away from the beauty is the “scrappiness “ of the quilt. Plus, your “ same color rectangles on the outside, to me, looks like a finishing border. I do love the look of this quilt!
Thanks Anne….that is a good thought!!
No, don’t put on the red in the border. It’s too heavy of a line and it takes away from the interior pattern. It’s too beautiful to have an outline around it.
Thanks Jill. I have gone back and forth!!
Your scrappy quilt is coming along nicely. I believe it needs the red border to hep my eyes focus on your delightful border.
Use the red!!! Thanks for sharing the journey.
Thanks Jeanne. That is what I have done, but it has certainly been interesting to hear what everyone has thought!!
The red on the edge helps me to see the red diagonal pattern in the interior. So I like the red. Again, amazing scrap project.
Yes, I think the red border is a nice addition. To my eye it calms the quilt and contains the wonderful light diagonals going every which way. The quilt looks like it is floating atop the pieced border. Have fun with this.
I also love the red border. It ties everything together.
I prefer the quilt without the red border. Having said that, I’m wondering if a red binding would do it justice instead?
I hadn’t thought about doing that Brenda…..thanks!!