Inner Beauty Quilt

I love scrappy and stash-friendly quilts, so I love designing quilts for my Stash Artists membership! Inner Beauty is our January pattern and I love, love, love this quilt. I briefly considered gifting it to someone, but nope! This one's mine 😄

I love how bright the teals, pinks, and purples are against the navy background. Plus I've always loved star quilts, so a double star quilt just makes me smile.

The Inner Beauty pattern was born when I specifically challenged myself to design something that would work for fat quarter bundles. Though I don't tend to buy them, I know there are a lot of quilters who have several bundles stored on a shelf waiting to be used. They're so pretty they count as decor, though, so it makes sense to keep them and admire them. On the other hand, it's even better to turn them into a quilt!

I don't have any fat quarter bundles myself, so I pulled fabrics from my stash. I knew as soon as I looked at the fabric pull that I was going to love the end result. As usual for me, there's a mix of batiks and prints. I stayed away from solids for this quilt because I find solids can sometimes feel flat when there's only one or two in the fabric pull. That doesn't apply to backgrounds, since the backgrounds aren't supposed to be the star of the show anyway. I did end up switching the clamshell fabric second from the top left when I decided I didn't want to have to deal with a directional fabric when making HSTs and flying geese.

Right around when I was assembling this quilt top, I gifted my Ombre Twirl quilt to a friend. While folding it and tying ribbon around it, I noticed the quilting and decided to repeat the meandering hearts and flowers on Inner Beauty. I used Aurifil 2785, which blends into the background perfectly and stands out on all the star fabrics. It's noticeable when you're up close, but not so noticeable from a distance.

The navy is so hard to photograph well for closeups.

The only fabric I had that was big enough for the back was the navy solid. Even though I don't usually like to match the back to the background of the front, I also don't like piecing backs, so the navy solid won. 

I always use the same thread in the top and bobbin, but I wanted something to make the back more interesting than it would be with the quilting blending in so much, so I decided to use Aurifil 2540 in the bobbin.

I love it! The purple seems to be glowing against the navy and it's exactly what I wanted to dress up the back.

When I'm designing a quilt with points right to the edge, I like to add a small, plain border. Binding is a little wider than ¼", so it tends to cover over the points if there's no buffer. A simple 1" border keeps those points looking pointy.

If you love scrappy, stash-friendly quilt patterns, too, join the Stash Artists waiting list so you'll be notified when the membership doors open again.

I think this quilt will be going in my regular rotation in the living room. Sitting under a quilt with a book is one of my favourite things and this Inner Beauty is begging to be seen and used.