Looking back: the Gone with the Wind quilt from 2013

Today, it’s time again to share some of my “quilt thinking” and reflections on one of my earlier quilts, and today’s quilt is Gone with the Wind / Tuulen viemää from 2013.

When I look at Gone with the Wind now, I notice immediately that quite a few blocks repeat the same fabrics. My present-day me would probably pick more fabric variety! A larger selection of fabrics might make the quilt even more interesting to the eye, and in that sense, the quilt might be “better”. But I’m very happy with the choices that I made back then.

Though I was inspired by a quilt image, I figured out the actual block measurements myself because I was still working with a centimeter ruler!

I never even tested the original tutorial by Coriander Quilts, so I don’t know if there is a big difference between my measurements and theirs.

Though I always wanted quick progress back then, but I still took the time to make test blocks. I made four versions before I was happy with the proportions. These were the first three tries:

Back in 2013, I did not quite recognise the concept of value contrast yet, but I made lucky choices in the basic design of this block: a mid-value feature fabric for the diagonal, then a white or nearly white strip, and a black or nearly black corner.

In the beginning of the project, I was going to use predominantly blue (and possibly grey as well), mid-value fabrics for the wide diagonals. In addition, I probably thought that I’d pick a few surprising colours too. Even then, I was drawn to using bold colours, as you can see in these four blocks:

And as a consequence, the final set of blocks did not look predominantly blue or grey:

So, the Gone with the Wind quilt did not have a colour plan. What’s more, most of the corners were black or nearly black, but then, for some reason, I made some of the corners bright red. What a great and bold idea that added a touch of surprise into the final design!

Though I wanted that quick progress, I clearly took time to achieve the perfect layout. I took a lot of pictures to find ideal places for each block. I’m particularly proud of myself for not accepting my first layout with the red corners visible here and there:

Instead, I managed to organise the blocks into a nice design while matching some red-cornered blocks to create a secondary pattern of a small red square.

When I’d made enough of these blocks, I added a border and a pretty nifty one at that even if I say so myself. The diamond shapes from the block continue in the border.

The quilt colours overall look quite successful even to my today’s eyes. Somehow, the composition is more daring than my go-to choice of today, which is to place darker-value blocks to the bottom and lighter-value ones to the top. In Gone with the Wind, though, there is a dark, almost mustard yellow area in the upper right-hand corner. And the lower edge reads lighter in value than the upper edge, especially on the right-hand side.

The quilting pattern is the perfect finishing touch for the quilt. Soile at Töölön Tilkkupaja’s longarm quilting service had a discerning eye already!

And I made good use of the unsuccessful test blocks and some of my sewing mistakes as they got a home in the quilt backing piece – one of my all-time favourites:

One thing I’ve definitely learned since making Gone with the Wind

It is important that the quilt block has value contrast when it is supposed to show a pattern. Colour contrast is not enough. Here, my blocks happened to all be like that and it made the quilt very successful.

But there is only one thing that looking back to Gone with the Wind made me realise. I could try to be less controlling when it comes to organising my blocks according to value. The lightest-value blocks don’t always have to be on the “upper edge” of the quilt.

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