31 January 2009

Shirt-stripe quilt


What do a pile of old shirts and a pair of men's pyjama pants have in common? Easy really - they are the basis for my next quilt. I have been scouring around in discount stores and op shops (thrift shops) for blue and white striped fabric to make Kaffe Fassett's shirt-stripe boxes quilt. As I love both blue and white and geometric shapes, this quilt has my name on it and I have been wanting to make it for ages. It is really difficult to buy blue and white stripes in new fabric so I took Kaffe's advice and am using old shirts (and pyjama pants, though that's my idea). This quilt should be very economical to make as I paid only $4.00 for most of these shirts and you get a lot of fabric in a shirt. You get even more for your money if you buy a pair of 'alpha male' extra large men's pajama pants.


Here is the first block.



Already I am experiencing that feeling of excitement and anticipation I always get when I start a new project. This is tempered somewhat by the knowledge that I have about 200 more of these to make in various sizes. This looks like being a very long-term project.

In these hard financial times, it makes me feel very virtuous to be creating something new from something old.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just brilliant! Oh I do wish we lived closer to each other. I just am itching to be creative!! I have begun a skirt with material I bought more than 6 years ago! I am very excited but our hot 45C weather has been a dampener- excuse the non pun!!
Good job! Can't wait to see more.

Anonymous said...

This is beautiful. It will be stunning no doubt!

Bonnie_Projects said...

You've inspired me to make one of these from my boyfriend's retired shirts. You did a fantastic job on this quilt!!!

Bonnie said...

I finally finished my dress shirt quilt! Thanks for the inspiration :)

http://bonnieprojects.blogspot.com/2013/02/quilt-from-upcycled-dress-shirts.html