treasures from the wardrobe

First up, thank you so much for all the input about my little challenge last week! The Lone Star pattern really is one of those 'oldies but a goodie'. I pulled my old WiP out from the depths of the wardrobe last week for another look, fresh eyes and all that! I figured there must be some way to make it into a quilt that could be used & loved.

Here’s a pic of my Lone Star I made in a traditional style many years ago. Pretty formal, and kinda severe looking, and not my usual scrappy style! It's put together in an organized manner with the same fabric used in the same placement in the diamonds that make up the star.












My unfinished quilt has sat carefully folded up in the wardrobe for so long, destined to be a UFO for life! And you know, sadly you do sometimes see unfinished quilts. There's lots of reasons why, many of them have problems, like maybe not sitting so flat! If the 1/4" piecing isn't accurate at the start on the Lone Star, the star will bulge in the middle. Luckily, my middle is flat.. well, on the star anyway!

I really wanted to bring it into the present day somehow. Over the week, I unpicked the star, washed it, and then the fun began! I was torn between trying 'modern' settings {see here and here} or do I go with keeping more of a traditional feel? I played with different fabrics for the background, I played with different border ideas, I played with larger scale prints, and I played with smaller prints more in keeping with the original!
It wasn't easy! And my personal fabric consultant, my daughter, didn't agree with any of my combinations! So, while I started out keen to revisit this quilt and give it a makeover only using what I had here, when the going gets tough... the tough go shopping! I popped out to all things patchwork and spent a lovely hour there pulling fabrics off the shelves for auditioning! The lady there, sorry don't know her name, was very patient!
I ended up choosing a loose woven check in blues with a thin peach stripe for the backgrounds, and a larger scale, deeper coral chintz print for the final border, which I think hope adds a bit of warmth and playfulness to the whole quilt!

So it was back down on the "design floor" again today laying it all out.

And here's what I finally came up with

... and I'm much happier!

Linking up with Julie over here at pink doxies

where there's lots of other lovely projects on the go too!