How to Create Depth in your Quilts

Last week we talked about Portrait Quilting™, and there's one thing I didn't get to: how a face made of purple and green fabric can still look like the person.

So here's the thing. It isn't the color doing that work. It's the value, which is just how light or dark a fabric is. Quilters have an old saying for this: value does the work and color gets the credit. If the lights are where the light falls and the darks are where the shadows sit, your eye fills in the rest, and you can use any colors you love.

The same idea is what adds interest to a Scrappy Appliqué™ quilt. By including lights, mediums and darks in the same collage, you add interest and depth to the design.

You can see the difference in effect with one Scrappy Applique applique piece where I didn't vary the value. Notice in the Oh Deer quilt below how there is a lot going on value-wise in the background (lights, mediums, and darks), but the applique piece alone is all medium yellows. If that medium value deer was on a plain background, he would look (in my opinion) a little boring. But the varied background saves him from that fate, in my opinion.

Try this tonight. Pull the fabrics for whatever you're working on, lay them side by side, take a photo with your phone, and switch the photo to black and white. If they all turn the same gray, the design will blur together. If you can see lights, mediums and darks, your quilt will likely have interest and depth! There's no right or wrong here, only the effect you're after.

And a little news. Next week I'm opening our annual Black Friday Sale early! The Scrappy Appliqué School & Library will be available for a few days at a huge discount. It's the full Scrappy Appliqué Workshop, walking you through the whole process step by step, plus the entire Pattern Library: over 250 patterns, from animals to city skylines to pups. It will be $97. (The Pattern Library on its own is $197.)

Early access opens Wednesday, November 18, for 48 hours, with a bonus for early birds. It opens again on Black Friday and closes Monday, November 30. We only do a sale once a year, so if you've been interested in Scrappy Applique, now is the perfect time to grab it!

If you'd like a reminder the moment it opens, click here and I'll send you one!