'Hot Stuff #1' ATASDA Workshop Sep 3, 2011. Learn how to use heat guns, synthetic fabrics, Tyvek, Angelina fibre and Textiva (fantasy film).

I am pleased as punch to announce I'll be running my first Heat Tools textile / multimedia workshop for ATASDAVic in a couple of weeks on September 3rd. We will be painting and distorting Tyvek and then layering synthetic fabrics with Textiva (fantasy) film and Angelina fibres, stitching a resist and using heat guns for impressive (and easy!!) results.

You will leave with your own heat distressed mini quilt and a knowledge of how to incorporate each of those materials and techniques into your own work.

Hot Stuff #1

Date: September 3rd

Time: 11am to 3pm

Where:  

Hartwell Church Of Christ Hall, cnr of Milverton & Highfield Rds Hartwell. (off Toorak Rd)

Cost: $40 for ATASDA members, $45 for non-members.  $5 materials fee if needed.

Materials lists will be emailed to all who enrol.

To book call Barbara: 0419 396 695

You will be making something that could look like this:

And turning it into something that looks like this:

some close ups:

When you're done you may want to turn it into a purse, use it as a background, a book cover or a stand alone art quilt. Here's my demo piece pinned into a purse:

I really hope to see you there! It's late notice and ATASDA Vic's first own workshop, so they've kept the costs down. Take advantage and book in!

Neroli

Burning a Quilt - Textile art with a Heat Gun and Synthetic Fabrics, Video Tutorial

This is my newest textile based artwork entitled "Pushing Up Daisies". I've created a video above so you can see the heat gun in action melting and distorting the fabric.

NB. when burning or melting any synthetic fabric, or cutting or scoring with a soldering iron work in a well ventilated area and wear a mask suitable for gas or vapours. You can buy disposables from large hardware stores.

I like to play with contrasts and in this case the normally pretty daisy flowers have been melted, and burnt, I like the way that this keeps the fragility inherent with flowers while giving it a harder, grittier edge.

I've played with burning before, most prominently in my leaf quilts, but with all of those I was melting smaller pieces and then using them to make or add to a larger work. In this piece I wanted to do a larger work and then burn the entire thing.

I've layered synthetic fabrics (felt, organza and satins) over cotton and stitched with Madeira metallic gold rayon and variegated rayon threads. I quilted the background quite intensely with little spirals as I having dense quilting here makes the stems, leaves and flower heads stand up more, and that in turns means they will burn quickest.

I used gold and copper Shiva oil paint sticks (I think these are called Markal paint sticks if you're in the UK) over the background quilting, these seemed to retard the heat effects on the background areas and the heat gun set the paint sticks instantly while only changing the colour slightly.

I love quilting on satin. The sheen really adds to the curves created by the quilting lines. The burnt areas of this are now essentially plastic, so it will either be framed or edged and hung for a wall piece.

Heat gunning will shrink a piece and I find it quite fun to watch it flatten and pull together. It helps the lesser quilted areas stand up even more.

This is my first video and I'm going to hopefully do some more in-depth video tutorials (both free and subscription) in the future. As always would love to hear any feedback - please leave a message in the comments section below.

Neroli

Quilt Binding, Edging and other finishes

When I work on a quilt one of the things I sometimes think of right at the start is how I'm going to want to finish it's edges.

I'm not a big 'functional sewing' fan - I'm the opposite of most people I know in that the artistic side seems to come easily, but give me a hem to take up and there's often serious unpicking. I am getting better, i've probably even managed a couple of shift type dresses without too many nasty swear words, but it's something I need to concentrate on to do - and even then cross my fingers and hope.

The same goes for traditional patchworking, which I'll admit to not having tried much of - matching points and inset seams (which still irk me so badly I don't design with them) just seem to be more luck then skill if they do work.

For this reason - and because I don't hand sew much at all (unless I want blood stains on my quilt :) !) while I am always after the edge treatment that suits my quilt the best, I'm also after the absolute easiest way to do it.

 Binding: 

For traditional bindings I always go back to this 3 part Sharon Schamber tutorial on You Tube. She uses a wash out craft glue (No pins! My third sewing nemesis after hand sewing and unpicking!!) to position and fit the binding - and check for mistakes before you sew. This method takes a little time (but less then hand sewing or unpicking!) but gives a wonderful tight, neat binding, even for functional sewing misfits like myself. :) Best of all the glue washes out completely!

For Sharon's wash out glued binding tutorial click here!

For the glue there is a wash out one available at Spotlight if you don't want to try and find the Elmers.

 Facings: 

For Facings I always go and revisit this tutorial page on Brenda Gael Smith's blog. I love how it links to a whole number of different facing finishes, showing how to do each one. There is also a pic showing 4 different ways to clip a corner and how each finishes up, that means I get to pick the one that suits my quilt the best without having to trial for myself :)

For Brenda's blog tute on facings click here!

There are so many other ways to finish the edges of a quilt though. 

 Selvedges / Transparent fabrics: 

This small quilt below (click on it for a bigger pic) submitted for a Self Portrait challenge had the selvedge edges (complete with fringing) cut from organza with a soldering iron (so there was no fraying). I just used a metal ruler on my glass hot plates to position the fabric, held with a ruler and then drew a line down the edge with the soldering iron to cut and seal it in one go. 

I then folded one of these over the top, another on each side and one on the bottom. To help manage translucent fabrics you can fuse them down with misty fuse (a see through fusible web) or do what I did hear and use wash out glue. A quick dunk in a water when finished washes it straight out and there's no slipping to worry about when you sew.

You could use conventional cotton selvedges cut with scissors or rotary cutter- with the branding etc printed on them and just hem the side that will go on the back and fold the selvedge to the front.

You could also use felt, vinyl or other non fray fabric.

 Melting the edge: 

For synthetic fabrics only - the quilt below was made with acrylic felt and lots of speciality synthetic fabrics (organza / satin / tulle etc). For it's edge I used the soldering iron to very slowly trace around the edge sinking it into the quilt a little more here and there to give an uneven edge. I had to wipe the soldering iron off frequently on a metal wool ball (which i purchased in a stand together with the soldering iron itself).

I used this same technique on the leaf quilt below. This one is backed on vinyl and I left some of the organza and tyvek leaves (also cut with a soldering iron) to over hang the edge.

You can use this technique for silk, you just have to work much slower and I'm not sure how it would work on battings etc. For silk it burns a fine edge as opposed to melting it.

 Stitching: 

You can use conventional close up zig zag stitch but if your machine does decorative stitches try out some of those and adjust the spacing closer together. The quilt edge below was done using the one sided grass stitch on my Pfaff. I upped the length to it's longest setting the made the width the smallest. (9mm and .2 respectively). Remember you can really change the look of a stitch by playing with it's length and width settings.

The red quilt is with grass stitch and the second has a metallic satin stitch.

 

 Couch a decorative edge: 

For this just do a basic zig zag (or small satin stitch if you like) all around the edge in a colour to match or contrast with your trim, then use your couching foot to apply a ribbon, brocade, yarn or even cut fabric strips to the quilt edge. I don't have a quilt to show you this one from myself though I know i've done it in the past - but the best example i've seen lately is in this really amazing quilt Judy Coates Perez created and uploaded to her blog. Her work is just wonderful.

 Remember your decorative presser feet: 

Along with couching over the top of zig zag you may want to try out any decorative feet you have for your machine. For the pfaff I have a fringing foot, a cording foot (which allows me to thread up to 9 decroative threads through holes and then to a fancy stitch over the top of them) and may others.

Here's a short video that shows the 9 hole cording foot from Pfaff. I think it looks great with a metalic thread in a decorative stitch on top.

Lastly:

 Freemotion the edge: 

Treat your edge like an extension of your quilt. For this small thread painted and fused collage piece I did a freemotion zig zag (but it could have been a straight or decorative stitch) over the edges and drew back into the quilt. I matched the thread to what I was working on - so oranges for the sky etc.

Basically as long as the edges are sealed you're good to go! If fraying is something you want - and you don't mind your batting showing (i think this would be a good look if you dyed your cotton batting to a colour that matches or contrasts your quilt) just do a line or two of straight stitch or freemotion around the edge. The purpose of a binding to to secure the quilt layers and stop them coming apart - so as long as you're pleased with the finished look and it's structurally sound it really doesn't matter what type of edging you use.

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