Back in November I received an invitation from my alma mater, The Oregon College of Art and Craft (OCAC), to be part of an exhibition wherein all of the artists would create work made out of repurposed Eileen Fisher clothing. How could I say, no?! The idea was that the folks at Green Eileen – an environmental initiative at Eileen Fisher which sells their gently used garments to fund programs that benefit women and girls – would send a shipment of their used clothes to OCAC for the artists to riffle through for their art projects.

I felt like a kid in a candy store. Eileen Fisher fabrics are so sumptuous, both in texture and color, and it didn’t take long to gather my palette. Neutral blacks, greys, and whites with a touch of color.

The next phase was to figure out my quilt design, and while I wanted the overall design to be a related to Eileen Fisher in some way, I certainly didn’t want it to be too overdone. What I love about Fisher’s clothing is its elemental beauty and how her fabrics layer and flow across the body. It was important that my quilt reflected that quality. The garments I hand picked needed to be recombined into a “new” textile, so my circle-blocks became the new units or “stitches”.

But first: deconstruction. And if ever I needed to pause before the first snip of the scissors, this was the time with a luscious Fisher garment in hand.

Next came cutting out the square block units.

1543 of them, and yes, I was counting.

Then the 1543 circles.

In the middle of all the cutting, my mom showed up for lunch, took one look at my diagram and my piles, and said, “Oh, honey, let me help with that”.  Thanks, Mom.

Keeping it all organized…

When it came time to appliqué the circles to the squares, I had to decide whether or not to use the conventional zig-zag stitching which would contain the edges of the circles. I decided against it because I didn’t want to lose the organic, unevenness of the circle edge.

Stacks finished and labeled so I could keep my mind straight.

It was really fun to see the quilt starting to take shape as I lay all the pieces out on my tables.

Sewing up the blocks in sections.

Lots of pinning required for all of the drapey fabrics.

 

Once the top was sewn together, I needed to decide how to quilt it – that is, how to connect the top, back, and batting. I really didn’t want to see lines of stitching interrupting the flow of the circle blocks, so I sewed a bar-tack at each of the 1543 block intersections. Again, I was counting.

Then what to do for the binding? I wanted a soft edge to be in keeping with the quilt surface, so I used strips of my favorite grey knit sweater along the outer edge.

Full quilt finally finished! Entitled, Coordinates.

The exhibition at The Oregon College of Art and Craft Centrum Gallery will be up for the month of May, beginning first Thursday of the month. Come see it in person!