Purple Mountain Majesty

      114 Comments on Purple Mountain Majesty
At Sunrise in West Houston

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

“America the Beautiful” By Katherine Lee Bates
Quiet Shades By Kathy Engle for Whirligig Designs

This beautiful poem by Katherine Lee Bates is my inspiration for this quilt, Purple Mountain Majesty. Bates was inspired by her visit to Pikes Peak in Colorado.

Welcome to my turn on the Beat the Heat Blog hop. Early this year, Island Batik sent each ambassador samples from one of their spring or summer 2019 lines. This month, all of us who got the spring collection are showing off our projects. I view this as a capstone project of sorts and wanted to make something very special and unique.

I’ve come to love this line of fabric with its muted tones and elegant, low-volume prints. But this is way out of my comfort zone. I usually work with bright, saturated colors with high contrast. By April, I had started panicking since I still didn’t have an idea for this collection. Then one day, on my drive home, I heard this short segment on NPR called American Anthem on ” songs that rouse, unite, celebrate and call to action“. Everything fell together with this beautiful song – the muted purples, yellows and greens, sunrise and early morning mist, cool mountain air, hope for better times for America, our family trips to National Parks over the years, quiet and cool mountain hikes, escaping the Houston heat, Beat the Heat blog-hop…. Please listen to the NPR clip if you can. Also listen to this beautiful rendition by Ray Charles. Or my favorite – the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin. I am sure everyone – American or not – can appreciate this beautiful song.

Back to quilting. Most of my design work was on grid paper. I decided to use half-rectangle triangles (HRT) for the purple mountains, quarter-square triangles(QST) for the sunrise and the sky, and half-square triangles (HST) for the vegetation. I cut some pieces from several fabrics in the collection and “built” the quilt on the design wall.

I used AccuQuilt GO for most of the cutting. Given the number of HSTs and QSTs in the quilt, it was a real time saver. I could cut six blocks at once and absolutely no trimming HSTs and QSTs!

Hobbs Batting had sent a silk blend batting in with my Island Batik box. I had not used silk before and I wanted to try. Silk blend batting is very lightweight and even after I quilted this heavily, it drapes nicely and lies flat.

Swirls and pebbles for the sky.
Slanted lines for the mountains
Vertical wavy lines for the vegetation

I used swirls, pebbles and McTavishing-like lines for the early morning sky, slanted lines for the mountains, and vertical wavy lines for the greens. I used two Isacord threads from my collection – eggshell for the light sky and light green for the forests. I used two Aurifil threads – the purple for the mountains and the orange for the brighter parts of the sky. With the design reaching all the way to the edge, I did not want to mess with a pieced binding. I sewed on a facing for this quilt and I love the way it looks. I’m going to consider sewing a facing instead of binding for modern quilts in the future.

More fabrics from the collection for the back
No mountains in Houston but we can do molehills and lakes!

Disclosure: The fabrics for this project was provided by Island Batik, the batting by Hobbs batting, some thread by Aurifil threads and the AccuQuilt Go! by AccuQuilt, all as part of the Island Batik ambassador project. I want to thank IB and all its partners for the opportunity to play and work with their products.

I have a giveaway for you. I have some leftover fabric from my project. This bundle includes two fat quarters (18″ X 22″) and about 5″-6″ X 20″ cuts of all the other fabrics in the collection. I will be happy to mail this for one lucky winner anywhere in the world. To enter, leave a comment and tell me what’s your favorite mountain town (my favorite is Banff in the Canadian Rockies!). Follow me on Instagram or Bloglovin or “Like” my page on Facebook or by email and leave comment telling me how you follow me for an additional entry. I will pick a winner on Sept 1st and announce on Sept 2nd. Please make sure you are not a no-reply blogger or leave me an email when you comment. Your email is only visible to me and NOT visible publicly. Linking to Giveaway party hosted by Slice of Pi Quilts.

In addition, Visit the Island Batik blog for a chance to win a pre-cut of this beautiful fabric – Quiet Shades.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Visit the other ambassador blogs this week to see how they Beat the Heat!

Monday, August 19 – Petal Pushers
Joanne Hart
Carla Henton
Tuesday, August 20 – Quiet Shades
Connie Kauffman
Vasudha Govindan
Wednesday, August 21 – Seedlings
Vicki Schlimmer
Mania Hatziioannidi
Thursday, August 22 – Soil & Seeds
Gail Sheppard

Monday, August 26 – Steam Engine
Maryellen McAuliffe
Jennifer Strauser
Tuesday, August 27 – Sunny Side Up
Connie K Campbell
Joan Kawano

114 thoughts on “Purple Mountain Majesty”

  1. Sandy Allen

    Your quilt is stunning! Love the play of colors you used.

    I haven’t seen many mountain towns, but as a child we went to Silverton, Colorado. It holds many fun memories of getting there through the mountains and learning about the history of the area.

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  2. Gail

    Your quilt brought out the beauty of the subtle colors in this fabric collection. It shows how color placement can make a color shine or just exist. It reminds me of Colorado Springs and Estes Park when we visited Colorado a few years ago.

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  3. Allison Evrard

    What a beautiful quilt! I love the purple mountains. My favorite mountain town is Estes Park, Colorado where Rocky Mountain National Park begins.

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  7. Cecilia

    Your quilt is beautiful! It represents the poem very well. I guess my favorite mountain town would be the small towns in the Great Smokey Mountains.

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  9. Linda Williamson

    Front Royal, Virginia is at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains and the entrance to the Shenandoah National Park. It has a wonderful historic Main Street with shopping and food. Thanks for sharing your wonderful quilt.grinnie1961 at gmail dot com

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  10. piecefulwendy

    Oh my, that quilt is a beauty! My favorite mountain town (I haven’t been to many) would probably be Idyllwild, California, nestled in the San Jacinto mountains.

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  13. Joyce Carter

    Your quilt is really beautiful. You made great use of these fabrics. Thank you for the chance to win some.
    I love the Great Smokey Mountains in North Carolina.

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  18. Alice Martina Smith

    Oh, my! What a stunning quilt! I love your design inspiration poem (I sing it all the time!) and these quiet colors came together in glory in your quilt! Inspiring!

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  19. Nancy

    I had a dream trip to Chamonix, France last year, and that is a stunning mountain town! Your quilt is a work of art and the quilting just makes it sing! Beautiful indeed!!

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  21. Denny K

    Great use of the fabric. Striking design and great interplay between the quilt blocks to produce gradients and contrast. Amazing quilting as usual. Very nicely done!

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  22. Rebecca Grace

    What a beautiful way to interpret the imagery of a song’s lyrics! Purple Mountain Majesty is majestic, indeed. Great job!

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  23. Joan

    Beautiful design and the quilting is awesome! Even with no mountains in Houston, the molehill is perfect!
    LOL!!

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  24. Carla G Hundley

    Fabulous design and
    great story with it. We
    live near mountains
    and love visiting Durango
    in Colorado.
    Carla from Utah

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  25. Yolanda

    My mantra, “the mountains are calling and I must go”, a borrowed quote that rings true to me and your beautiful quilt does as well. LOVELY!

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  27. Denise

    The quilt looks like an extension of the grass in the grassy photos. I know this took a lot of time to come up with color and block placement. Sometimes I think we are unappreciated in that aspect. You did a fabulous job and the quilting is beautiful.

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  29. Diantha Howard

    I think my current favorite mountain town is Steamboat Springs. We spent a week there with our son and his wife and enjoyed the town, plus we went up the mountain and walked around there too.

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  32. Lori Smanski

    When I lived in CA we had a farm in Apple Valley at the base of Big Bear Mountain. About once a month we would go into the mountains. We always had such fun. One winter we were going to go ice skating but could not. Peggy Flemming was practicing. Ohhhhh what a site. I so wanted to be like her at the time. quilting dash lady at comcast dot net

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  33. Pam Jolly

    My favorite mountain town is North Bend, Washington. It is at the base of the Cascade Mountains and has Mount Si on the out skirts of town. It is a beautiful small town and I loved living there. Your quilt is gorgeous and the inspiration for it wonderful.

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  36. Michele T

    I’ve only been out west once and was amazed when the mountains peeked out in the horizon. My favourite is also the rocky mountains in Banff.

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  38. rl2b2017

    Hi Vasudha! What a wonderful post, and now I’m humming that song. Could there BE a better fabric to represent this whole theme?! I can almost feel myself with you in the car as the inspiration came to you. It gives me the chills. This is the second post I’ve read today that features some HRT – you both are inspiring me to get on this bandwagon and make something using them. Your quilting is wonderful and perfect for the different areas. It’s really a lovely piece. ~smile~ Roseanne

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  41. shadesofrandom

    What a beautiful quilt! It made me a bit homesick. I grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania. I guess I would have to say that Lilly, Pennsylvania is my favorite mountain town.

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  50. Peggy

    I lived in Tucson, AZ, USA for several years. I loved being able to look up to the mountains from my office window. I loved being able to camp in the mountains. I consider Tucson a mountain town.

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