2006 November archive at Quilts and Creativity

Archive for November, 2006

Color Lesson 7: Creating an Analogous Color Scheme in Your Quilt

Published at November 29, 2006 in Color Lessons. 0 Comments

Analogous Color Wheel

Analogous colors are those next to each other on the color wheel. They are similar in color and have very little contrast, meaning they blend well together. Contrast means that one color stands out from the next. One way to remember analogous colors is that they are neighbors on the color wheel and they get along famously (don’t we all love our neighbors?)

So how does this apply to making a quilt? Analogous colors always go well together. If you want to make a red quilt, look to those colors next to it and add some of those: red-orange, orange, and red-violet. Those colors together make a knockout color combination. But how can you be sure?

Your color journal! This is where you are going to create an analogous color scheme of your choice to see if it works before you commit to a quilt. Who wants to spend a month or two on a quilt only to find out at the end those color don’t really work together?

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Analogous Color Scheme in My Color Journal

So here’s what you need to do to create an analogous color scheme in your color journal:

Select a color you want to use on the color wheel.
Select those colors next to it, or the analogous colors. You can go to the right, left, or both of your original color.
Go to your stash and cut fabric swatches for each one of the colors in your analogous color scheme. You can even pick several swatches for each color to really add variety to the color scheme.
Paste them down in your color journal and title the page “Analogous Color Scheme.”

Extra Credit: See if you find one piece of fabric in your stash that contains analogous colors. This shouldn’t be difficult, as many quilter’s fabrics contain analogous colors.

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Color Lesson 6: Identifying Color Relationships in Your Quilt

Published at November 28, 2006 in Color Lessons. 0 Comments

Did you make your color wheel? How did you find the experience? Did you have all those colors in your stash? Most quilters have them, they just haven’t thought of the colors in terms of red-violet, they call it magenta. Or blue-green is turquoise.

Have you ever wondered why a color wheel is necessary in the first place? Early painting teachers (we’re talking renaissance here) needed a way to teach students about the similarity and contrast among colors, and the easiest way to do that was to put the colors in a circle. Colors next to each other were similar (analogous) and those opposite each other contrasted (complementary). So that’s why we use a wheel and use those same terms today. Even though we aren’t painters, we are creating color relationships with fabrics in our quilts, and we can benefit from the same lessons as painters.

Only quilters don’t have to mix paints to get pink: we can just swing by our favorite quilt shop and pick up our favorite pink fabric, along with some thread, a book, and a pattern to boot.

In the next lesson we’re going to tackle those color relationships and create some samples in our journals.

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Color Lesson 5: Creating a Quilter’s Color Wheel

Published at November 9, 2006 in Color Lessons. 0 Comments

I was afraid of losing my own color style if I learned the color wheel, so for years I resisted. Finally, I gave in, feeling like I didn’t know the “secret handshake” of all those art quilters who kept going on about the color wheel.

Interestingly enough, I didn’t learn it as a quilter, I learned how to use the color wheel when I began taking watercolor painting courses. I had to mix my own colors and it was imperative that I know the colors on the wheel, how they interacted, what made a color dull, what made it intense, and why some colors went together well and others didn’t.

So I took that knowledge I gained in watercolor and applied it to my quilts. And I never did lose my own color style, I simply made the colors I liked work better together. I was no longer afraid of using ANY color in a quilt, because now that I knew the color wheel, I could coordinate any color with any other color. They all go together if you know how to do it.

And you get to learn how. But again, baby steps.

Download the color wheel I’ve created for you here. Print it out onto card stock or trace it onto posterboard so that it will last. Click here to download.
The wheel has twelve numbered spaces, just like that of a clock. You are going to cut fabric swatches and glue stick them down onto the wheel. The fabric colors and their placement are as follows:

Yellow-Orange - 1
Orange - 2
Red-Orange - 3
Red - 4
Red-Violet - 5
Violet - 6
Blue-Violet - 7
Blue - 8
Blue-Green - 9
Green - 10
Yellow-Green - 11
Yellow - 12

Don’t fret over perfectly-sized squares or a perfect-looking wheel. The point here is to get the colors down and evaluate what you have in your stash.

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Color Lesson 4: Creating a Color Palette with Fabrics You Don’t Like

Published at November 6, 2006 in Color Lessons. 0 Comments

Caterpillar Color Journal

This is a color exercise that will really flex your creative muscles. After all, we all like working with fabrics we enjoy, but what about using fabrics you can’t stand?

Why am I having you do this?

Because at some point, you are going to be asked to make a quilt with colors you don’t like. It may be for a gift, for a fundraiser, for a friendship quilt, or one of a thousand other reasons. But who wants to work on a project, especially as long as a quilt takes, using colors you don’t like?

And you are going to learn much more from using colors you aren’t comfortable with than with colors you love. So, here goes:

Select a photo or a magazine page with colors that just make your skin crawl. I mean you really can’t stand the colors. Then insert it in your journal. For my color journal, I took a photograph of a Black Swallowtail caterpillar in my front yard. I couldn’t believe its color combinations: light and dark green, yellow, and black. Yuk!
Select one swatch of fabric for each hue in the photo. Glue these swatches down in your color journal and call them Palette #1.
Now make some changes to the palette. Try using lighter or darker values, swapping some hues for others, or adding some other hues to the palette.
Number each subsequent palette.

Palette #2 contains the first change I made to my palette. I removed the black and substituted dark blue. Black can appear flat and lifeless, so I wanted to create a similar dark feel with another dark hue. I think the blue worked well.

I still didn’t like the overall palette, so I added some other hues and values to Palette #3. I added some medium values greens to transition between the light and dark greens, and I warmed up the overall palette by adding violet and red. I really like the palette now and it is one I could work with in a quilt.

I also selected a single fabric that contained the original hues in the palette and pasted it above the photo.

This took some trial and error. I auditioned several fabrics before I came up with a combination I liked. Don’t be discouraged if it takes you a while to do this. Keep trying and feel free to upload your palette when you’re done. If you leave a comment on this blog you can add a photograph to it easily. We would love to see your results!

Next week we are going to start on the color wheel, and it won’t be like any other discussion on the color wheel you’ve ever heard of or done. You’ll actually understand it and will be excited about using it!

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