Fabricadabra - Simple Quilts, Complex Fabric: Discover the Hidden Potential in Your Stash

by Paula Nadelstern

Overview

Fabricadabra! Discover your fabric’s hidden potential and sew complex-looking quilts that are easy to piece. Understand symmetry in fabrics and fool the eye with daring design strategies. Fussy cut prints to perfection with self-drafted templates and camouflage seams to get the “seemingly seamless” look made famous by quilter and fabric designer Paula Nadelstern’s kaleidoscopic quilts. Example piecing diagrams show you how to quilt a visual spectacle for luminous effects.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781617451881
Publisher:	C & T Publishing
Publication date:	11/01/2016
Pages:	112
Product dimensions:	8.40(w) x 10.90(h) x 0.30(d)

About the Author

Paula Nadelstern was the first contemporary quilt artist featured in a one-person exhibit at the American Folk Art Museum. She designs textile prints exclusively for Benartex, Inc. and travels extensively teaching her unique kaleidoscopic quiltmaking techniques. Paula lives in New York City.

Table of Contents

Quilt Gallery
Design Matters
Design Strategies
Seemingly Seamless • Common Ground • The Butterfly Effect • Sea Foam • The Kaleidoscope Legacy • Details, Details, Details • Line
Fabric
Prima Donnas • Bilaterally Symmetrical • Pseudo Symmetrical • Medallion Layout • Directionals • Classic Stripes • Wacky Stripes • Ombré • Allovers • Prints • Reads Like a Solid—Also Known as Tonals • Black is the Best Black • Black & White • Weird Greens • More Good Stuff • Batiks
Silk • The Hand of Fabric • Sashing and Border Ideas
Piece Policies
Tools
Templates
The Reason for Templates • How to Make a Template • Types of Templates • The Template Fabric Interface • Marking Clues on a Template How to Mark the Fabric • How to Cut the Fabric • Continuous Templates • Drafting Angles
Strip Piecing
Detangling Angles
Faux Curves
Behavior Problems
The Final Girdle
About the Author

Editorial Reviews

Stunning! What an incredible book. At first glance you might think, too complicated but look again – this book uses simple piecing to produce unbelievably complex-looking quilts. It’s all about fabric choices and unlocking the potential in those fabrics to create magical quilts. Understand symmetry and create dynamic combinations that fool the eye. Self-drafted templates help you to fussy cut. This amazing book includes a jaw-dropping quilt gallery and a design section. It is then split into Design Strategies, Fabric, Piecing, Tools and Templates. This book is all about the fabric and Paula designs her own. It’s about cutting the fabric and fitting a design around it. You’ll learn how to use templates, how to mark and cut fabric, how to make seams look seamless and so much more but this is not really a step-by-step to making the quilts. I have not seen anything else quite like this book and I love it.

11/13/2016 yarnsandfabrics.co.uk

Paula Nadelstern's book is full of colourful, kaleidoscopic quilts. They look incredibly complex but come from the author’s realisation that the complex quilts she had previously made could be simplified in structure, still retaining the detail and illusion of complexity through clever fabric choices.
Unusually, you start the book with the Gallery. Each quilt is described, a diagram provided of how it is constructed plus any notable detailing or story behind it. Fabrics used before they were cut are shown and compared to the pieces that are used in the finished quilt. They are all breathtaking in their patterns and colours.
Following the Gallery is a section on Design Matters where you learn more about the method of fabric cutting. This is illuminating and you can see how the author’s use of clear templates allows her to find the pattern within a larger piece of fabric and piece it all together to create a kaleidoscope. This is a new take on creating a new pattern repeat and the results are fantastic. There are further instructions on piecing techniques, how to cut fabric and work with angles (the author works with traditional patchwork blocks).
This book is great if you have a collection of ‘busy’ fabrics and want to give them a new lease of life. Finding a new pattern beyond what exists in your stash could be an addictive pastime.

December 2016 Workshop on the Web

The strap line 'discover the hidden potential of your stash' caught my eye as I am the owner of a large and ever increasing fabric collection! Many of my purchases languish in a drawer as I have no idea how I want to use them, so a book that promises new ideas and inspiration was a must read. Paula's suggestion is to use them in a kaleidoscopic quilt, and if you like this technique, the book will open your eyes to the many possibilities of this amazing method. Paula has been exploring the notion of kaleidoscopic quilts for many years, and explains how cutting and joining fabric pieces not only creates whole new blocks but how using the colours and shapes in the fabrics can create unexpected and eye-catching patterns and designs. The books starts with a gallery, and the quilts are truly spectacular. They are displayed against black pages which I found gave them a dramatic setting, but was a little heard on the eye. However, don't let this put you off as the book is truly a voyage of colour and creativity. The chapter on design features detailed explanations of Paula's design process and techniques which is very clever and clearly explained. There are no projects to complete as such but a wealth of information about how to draft patterns, draw templates and use the kaleidoscopic methods. This book provides a great insight into this method of making a quilt.

January 2017 Popular Patchwork