You have decided to make a simple quilt. But what kind? Take a good look at the bed it is for, and that answers most of the question.
Start from the bed
The size of the bed determines the size of the quilt, which determines how many blocks you need, which determines how much fabric to buy. Everything follows from it.
Measure the mattress, then decide how far down the sides you want the quilt to hang and whether it needs to cover pillows. Add those to the mattress width and length.
Write that number down before choosing anything else. A great many quilts are designed first and sized afterwards, which is how people end up with something that does not fit the bed.
Then the pattern
Simple shapes produce the most interesting quilts, which is counter-intuitive and worth trusting.
Squares and half-square triangles between them produce an enormous proportion of traditional designs. The interest comes from how blocks are arranged and where the light and dark fall, not from the complexity of any individual block.
Complex blocks frequently look worse repeated, because there is too much happening for the eye to find a pattern.
Sharp geometric designs – the bold, high-contrast Pennsylvania Dutch style among them – work precisely because the shapes are simple and the contrast is strong.
Then the colours
The rule that matters: value counts more than colour.
A quilt’s pattern is made by the arrangement of light and dark, not by the arrangement of hues. A design in five shades of one colour can be more striking than one in five different colours, if the values are well distributed.
Photograph your fabrics in black and white before committing. If they all read as the same grey, the design will be flat however different they look on the shelf.
Working with the room
Take a colour from something already in the room – a curtain, a painting, a rug – and build around it. A quilt that relates to its surroundings looks intentional.
Before cutting
Make one block. Just one.
It tells you whether the colours work, whether the block comes out the size it should, and whether you enjoy making it. All three are worth knowing before cutting fabric for forty.
Then lay several out on the floor and photograph the arrangement from a distance. What looks balanced up close often does not from across a room.
