I primarily quilt freehand designs for myself and customers, no patterns just doodling. This practice really lends itself to developing Custom Quilting skills. I love whole cloth quilts, but, do whole cloth quilts have to be intricately quilted with specific motifs like feathers, vases and wreaths in order to be beautiful?

I’ve made a few whole cloth quilts: one trapunto, one faux trapnuto, one from an antique linen handkerchief, a baby bib and there are a few more hanging around – ALL with stenciled intricate designs. Everyone thinks they look great, but what if you didn’t search for special motifs to quilt?

Recently a customer requested, simple edge to edge quilting on her white polished cotton top fabric and grey solid backing fabric. I ended up making five of these in different edge to edge / overall patterns I offer:

Swirls and Feathers

Petal Power

Matisse (which has dancing people and goddesses in it)

Lazy Daisy, and

Swirls with Fancy Feathers

I’ve decided that a whole cloth is beautiful no matter what design. A bonus for me, right now I’m really enjoying working with solid fabrics so the solid grey backing gave me a chance to play with thread color. I used a very light yellow thread on the grey and think it looks great! (white thread on top)

My recommendation as a long arm quilter – the most dimension you can achieve in a quilt, aka emphasizing the high and lows, light and shadows, or distinctions in the puffiness in the quilting– is best done with either wool of poly batting. My favorite is Quilter’s Dream Wool.