Design Wall Monday--see more great quilty things on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts blog.
I have long wanted a design wall, but not a permanent one. Previously I had used a flannel backed tablecloth hung on the wall in my first sewing room in an upstairs bedroom. It worked well, but in the open former family room where I am now, I needed it to be easily put away. Years ago at a quilt show I had bought a Hangit-Dangit quilt hanger and felt that was my best option for a temporary design wall. Surprisingly, finding a decent quality flannel-backed tablecloth took a three store search. I was not able to find a solid colored one, but for $3 at Big Lots, I found one with a white background.
It is a pretty busy print with the bicycles and phrases, but I went forward with my efforts. I held it up to the wall to determine how much to fold over to keep it off the floor. Duct tape worked great to make the "hanging sleeve". The HangIt DangIt is a telescoping rod with a plastic hanger that snaps over the center.
I also put duct tape over the center of the design wall where I cut a slit for the hanger. One nail pounded in, and it was ready to try out.
I threw up a few blocks to see if they held. Ta-da! It worked great. The main reason I wanted a design wall was for the bookshelf quilt project for my niece, Emma, that stalled out.
The brown strips are the shelves--cut full WOF, which is the size limit I settled on for this project. I worked many hours on adding more details and playing in the scrap bins.
Lots of fun! For the cherries embroidery on the second shelf, I am thinking it would be fun to make it sit on an easel. I will also add some other objects, bookends and maybe a mini quilt or other art object. There will be five shelves so I have lots more scraps to incorporate. The pieces are in no particular order now. I see an oops block to fix that has the black background on the bottom instead of the top! Many many more book pieces are needed as these will shrink when sewn together, of course. I've pinned some great ideas on Pinterest. So glad to be making progress again!
6 comments:
I need one of those...currently, I have a design floor!!
I've been wanting a design wall for a long time. Your way sounds more feasible for my space. I've been wanting to make a bookshelf quilt for a long time. One day I will be able to fit it in between all the other quilts I want to make.
Never heard of Hangit-Dangit before. Sounds like a great product. I have a white bedsheet as a design wall. It does the trick but I have to pin the blocks to it, so when I want to play with the layout of the quilt, I go to the floor. It's faster that way. Kudos to you for getting a neat design wall. ;^)
Cool idea! Love this bookshelf project!
That definitely looks like a project that NEEDS a design wall. Glad you were able to make it work.
That is a pretty intensive project, from where I'm sitting. Very clever.
I've got a design wall that I made after joining flannel panels... It works though looking at it today I see it needs to be cleaned of all the tread ends left behind. It also needs to have it's "stickyness" revived pretty soon... maybe with a brush or something?
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