inspiration :: english paper piecing

Hello Owls!

Thanks to everyone who came by the Canberra Creatives Mega Craft Day to say hi on Saturday! I had a lot of fun on the Brown Owls stall - it was lovely to see so many familiar faces, and to make some new friends too!

I really enjoyed showing some of the things we've made at our meetings over the past few years,  and to talk to people a bit about one of my current favourite crafts: english paper piecing.

 

Of course there are LOADS of tutorials online to help you get started on your english paper piecing adventure, my favourite happens to be the series Katy (I'm a Ginger Monkey blog) prepared for the Fat Quarterly blog - you can find them here.

On her blog Katy also has a really cool free pattern for a paper pieced cushion called Spring Carnival, which would be the perfect first project before committing to a whole quilt.

I was lucky enough to learn paper piecing in person from one of our very own owls, Michelle, who has taught it at a couple of Brown Owls workshops. Michelle also happens to have made my very favourite english paper pieced quilt - that's her twisted hexagons quilt hanging in last years Canberra Quilters Exhibition. You can read more about it, and see more photos, on her blog here and here.

And because I love looking at them, here are some of my favourite hexies from flickr.

1. jardins de grand-mère, 2. Grandmother's Flower Garden, 

3. Hexagon pillow, 4. Hexie party, 

5. in progress..., 6. Hexie Quilt Update 4-18-12

Of course, there's loads more inspiration to be had on flickr - check out the handsome hexies group (there are some really AMAZING pics!!)

I hope that's given you some places to go for more information, and inspiration, about english paper piecing! 

We'd love to hear from you too! 

Have you tried english paper piecing? Are you addicted to hexies? Do you know of any great tutorials or patterns we should check out and share? Have you made something lovely with english paper piecing that you'd like to show off? Pop a comment below, or shoot us an email so we can share!

Happy crafting!

ps. don't forget our next meeting will be held on Saturday 25 May, 2pm at the Downer Community Centre.