Diamond Showers

      51 Comments on Diamond Showers

Today is my turn in the Be a Diamond Blog hop hosted by Carol at Just Let Me Quilt. My quilt is called diamond showers. It is my original pattern. It started out as a elaborately planned paper-pieced pattern but turned into imrpov paper-pieced as it progressed.

I am really proud of the pattern and the way I designed it. I will post a design tutorial on how to design your own large-scale paper-pieced patterns.

Dresden plate before chopping off a section on the right. Checkout the huge carpenters’ compass. It lets me draw a circle up to 20″ radius.

The pattern is designed as blades/wedges of a Dresden plate. The diamonds are part of the blades. The blades are 18 degrees – needs 20 to complete a circle. Each blade has 4 or 5 diamonds and no two blades are the same. I randomly picked some diamonds to be the same color as the background. This gives the appearance of diamonds floating or showering down from above. Once the plate was assembled, I did not want the full circle – I chopped off about 5 inches on one side before appliqueing it to the background fabric.

My quilting machine is a 15″ BlockRockIt – which is the same as a Grace Q’nique. 15″ is not much to work with but I find it better than quilting on a domestic.

As you can see, I went completely crazy with the free-motion quilting. I used a ruler to just outline the diamonds – no quilting at all inside the diamonds. The background is heavily quilted using whatever motif came to mind. I quilted this on Sunday in a single session of about 4 hours. I still need to add a hanging sleeve and a binding, but I had to get pictures before the sun went down.

Chain of swirls runs along the length of the quilt.
Some seedpods and feathers. The blue in this picture is heavily distorted.
More feathers and some McTavishing and a funky wheel.
More feathers, a peacock, some pebbles and rocks. An attempt at matchstick quilting.
This photo shows off the texture of the quilting.

The details:
 Diamond Showers
Size: 42″ X 56″
Background: Kona cotton Regal
(It is a deep, dark blue-purple. The colors are fairly accurate in the long shots. The color in the close-ups are heavily distorted.)
Diamonds: Alison Glass Sunprints 2018 and 2019
Quilting: freemotion
Thread: Aurifil 50 wt Mako Cotton #2745 (midnight)

Please visit all the other quilters on this awesome blog-hop:

April 22
 Needled Mom
Keepsake Moments
Kathy’s Quilts
Kathy’s Kwilts and More
Color, Creating, and Quilting
April 23
Ms P Designs USA
Vroomans Quilts
Marjorie’s Busy Corner
Melva Loves Scraps
Storied Quilts
Words & Stitches
Clever Chameleon Quilting
Songbird Designs
April 24
MooseStashQuilting
Beaquilter
Vicki’s Crafts and Quilting
Creative Blonde 
Selina Quilts
Bumbleberry Stitches
Two Maker Chicks
Quilts By Joanne
April 25
Patchouli Moon Studio
Elizabeth Coughlin Designs
Hill Valley QuilterMageez Room
Websterquilt
High Road Quilter
Seams To Be Sew
April 26
Creatin’ in the Sticks
Cynthia’s Creating Ark
Days Filled With Joy
For The Love Of Geese
Quilt Fabrication
Stitchin At Home
Just Let Me Quilt

Linkups:
Colour Tuesday
Bee Social
Midweek Makers
Wednesday Weight loss
Needle and Thread Thursday
TGIFF @ Alycia Quilts
Whoop Whoop Friday
Friday Foto fun
Finished or not Friday
Freemotion Mavericks
Favorite Finish monthly @ MeadowMist

51 thoughts on “Diamond Showers”

  11. Janice Snell

    Amazing! I love your project and thanks for the explanation of how you made it. You make it sound so easy! Thanks for sharing!

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  19. rl2b2017

    Hi Vasudha! I love to see your finished quilts and especially your quilting. Oh those chain of swirls – such movement! This is really such a beautiful pattern and I never would have suspected it was appliquéd. The absence of quilting in the diamonds really seem to make them stand out. What a great finish! ~smile~ Roseanne

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  26. Anja @ Anja Quilts

    Wow. This is amazing. I was surprised to see it was a circle to start. I’ll take you 15 inches — I’ve got a Pfaff mounted on a frame, and I’ve only got 6 inches. But like you say, it’s better than using a domestic.

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  28. Carla

    Diamond Showers is amazing. So modern and the quilting is fantastic. I love everything about this quilt and your process is so interesting. Thanks for sharing it.

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  29. Lisa England

    I agree with everything Carla said above. The piecing is very cool and the quilting — oh my goodness, you’ve got serious skills!

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  31. Joan

    Holy cow! (for lack words) This is absolutely stunning. The design, the quilting, the vision you had for it. I can hardly wait to see your tutorial on designing large scale quilts! Awesome, just awesome!

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  38. Sandra Walker

    Stunning, delicious, sumptuous, regal, sparkly…I could go on and on. I do believe I salivated when I first saw this thumbnail at Free Motion Mavericks, and I suspected it was you…your style, that fence…Oh Vasudha!! About 4 hours…gulp! Love seeing the machine you use. Mine is 18″. I cannot believe you pieced those diamonds into the wedge; I figured they were appliquéd on! Genius and wizard in one. You know I”m heading to my husband as soon as I’m done typing to ask if he has a carpenter’s compass…and again wizard, no, enchantress you are to have cut some of the circle off! I was like, wait, what? It’s not all there? Wonderful wonderful quilt.

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  43. Needle and Foot

    I believe this is my first time visiting here. I found you through the link up at Meadow Mist today.
    This quilt is just amazing. What a great idea to piece the wedges on a Dresden to get this effect. I had never considered playing with a Dresden like that but there are so many possibilities. Just incredible.

    Your quilting is superb. How you did that in four hours is beyond me. Well done. Really really beautiful.

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  44. inquiringquilter

    I love the design decisions you made throughout this! Love the part circle, the deep blue background, the gorgeous quilting! Thanks for sharing on Wednesday Wait Loss.

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  47. cheryljbrickey

    Wow! The quilting is stunning on this quilt! Thank you for showing an in-progress picture, I would not have guessed you used a Dresden plate style block to piece it. Thanks for linking up with the Favorite Finishes Monthly Linky Party!

    Reply ↓

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