The V and A Sampler Quilt

1. Fassett recommends two important quilting tools; the flannel covered design wall and a reducing glass. By using these tools, a little fabric may be wasted, but rarely is time wasted ripping and re-sewing obvious errors.

2. Fassett recommends working on a vertical surface as it's similar to painting on an easel.

3. Great color harmony is achieved because this design process makes editing easy.

Design Wall

Homasote can be purchased at a lumberyard or large hardware stores. There are many other manufacturers of this kind of product and any would work fine. Homasote is used to insulate walls of newly built homes and comes in 4' x 8' lightweight sheets and is covered with foil on one side and a pink or blue paper on the other side.

- Two sheets of insulation board (Homasote) were used to make a board big enough to design a queen-sized quilt.

- The insulation board is covered on one side by gluing a neutral (dull-light brown or taupe) colored, good quality cotton-flannel. Smear or spray glue on the board and place the flannel on the boards and smooth out. Trim the edges.

- Make hinges to hold the two boards together with duct tape. Place three hinges on the wrong side of the boards, making sure the hinges were loose enough to allow the board to fold in, flannel sides together. The wall can be free standing with just a little bend at the hinges. If you need to put the wall away with a design in the works, just place paper over the work and fold the boards together and slide under a bed.

Reducing glass

The purpose of a reducing glass is to preview your composition to see the whole structure as the reducing glass reduces the image size. It creates a tight image that will make colors that don't flow with the design really stand out. Remove colors that are not essential at this point.

A reducing glass looks like a normal magnifying glass but it miniaturizes the image. A peephole door insert or a camera for viewing the composition of a quilt on a design wall can also be used.