TBT - Bargello

It's time for another edition of Throwback Thursday!  Please join me (see links at the bottom) and show off one of your earlier projects.

One day early in my quilting career, I was browsing quilts and came across a bargello. That technique immediately went onto my "someday" list, as something that I wanted to try.  A while later, I splurged on a book about bargello quilts, and how to design them. I did some reading, and in September of 2009 I took the plunge.  I picked up some fabric in my favourite turquoise colourway, and came up with the concept of a water scene for my bargello.  I sketched it all out, just like the book said, and started cutting strips.

I was a little leary of the method used in the book I was reading, for assembling the bargello. It had you stitch each line of the design directly to the batting/backing. So essentially a quilt as you go bargello. I still don't know if that's the usual method, but I admit that it kept things straight and square quite nicely.

When I laid out my strips, based on my design, I was not happy at all with the results. I'm not sure what didn't translate, from paper to fabric, but this first cut wasn't working. So I played around, rearranging strips.  I had to work with what I had, as all the fabric had been used already.  A few tweaks over the next couple of days resulted in something that I felt resembled a waterfall, as I had wanted.

This quilt was slowly assembled over a couple of months, and finally finished in January 2010.  The advantage of the assembly method was that when the top was assembled, it was already quilted. All I had to do was add the borders, and quilt the large border so it would stay nice and flat.

I still want to make another bargello one day - something a bit more adventurous with an interweaving design.  But while they are beautiful quilts in the end, the assembly process is a bit repetitive and I think that's what has kept me away from another attempt thus far.

The rules are simple (and flexible :) ). Write a post (or revive an old one) about an old quilt or project that you have - maybe something from your pre-blogging days, or just a project you love that you want to show off again. Please include a link back to this post in yours, and when you link up make sure you are linking to your specific blog post, not just your blog address. You want to make sure people can find your post if they drop by the linkup later.

Add your link, and check out some of the other links for some inspiration. See my sidebar for a TBT button you can add to your blog.