Priscilla Read – Art Journey

I attended two of Maria Shell’s workshops a couple years ago at my local quilt guild. I was attracted to her bold use of color and design, and felt lucky to take two in person classes locally where I felt free to experiment and try out combinations that I might not have considered on my own.

In the Linear Blocks – Line into Shape workshop, I pieced solid fabrics to make striped fabrics, then played with the composition until I made a block that created interesting secondary patterns when placed next to each other. By the end of the day, I had the block idea, but did not sew them together until I got home and worked on the design a bit more.

Once I was happy with my design, I continued making striped fabric until I had enough to play with on my design wall. I didn’t sew them into blocks until I arranged the components several times. I machine quilted with curved and straight lines to cross the blocks to superimpose a new design layer. 

For Maria’s Kitchen Sink Workshop , we brought leftover blocks and an assortment of scraps and experimented with ways to turn it into a composition.

I set this aside a few months, then finished it at a quilt retreat. It took awhile and lots of quilting practice on other pieces before I decided how to quilt it.