Cultural Fusion Quilts, A Melting Pot of Piecing Traditions by Sujata Shah, published by C & T brings a sense of fun to the Q-niverse. Sujata brings all of who she is, all of those things that have influenced and informed her love for color and texture to quilt making in a way that is, well, so much fun!
Sujata encourages us to:
Be Curious
Be Bold
Be Spontaneous
Be Creative
Be Intuitive
with our fabric color, texture and scale of print. With this kind of encouragement how can our quilts and quilt making be anything but fun and fab?
From the quilts of Gee’s Bend to the fabrics and colors of her home country of India, to architecture and the patterns and texture of African Mud Cloth, Sujata shares her sources of inspiration throughout the book. With such a wide range of inspiration her quilts are always fresh and unique.
She incorporates a mix of technique from free form cutting to using rulers and acrylic templates to achieve the look and style she’s going for. Using these techniques together has the potential effect of giving us permission to have fun with our quilt making. Use all of those fabrics in our stash together to create.
Sujata dedicated Cultural Fusion Quilts to her parents with these words:
“To my father, Jagmohandas Gandhi,
and my mother, Saudamini Gandhi.
My father taught me to feel the dirt in my toes and smell the flowers. Without him, I wouldn’t know to be authentic and true to my soul and surroundings.
My mother showed me to be curious and creative,improvise, and embrace life to its fullest. Without her exuberance, I wouldn’t know to appreciate little things that matter the most.”
Crazy Quilt
Crazy Quilt, the first pattern, has three different lay out options with a variety of looks.
Sunset
Sujata shares the inspiration for Sunset: “There is something magical about the sky changing colors with the passing of every second at dusk. The last rays of sunshine paint the clouds, deep blue waves carry liquid gold to the shore, palm trees sway gently in the wind, and birds fly in a hurry to call it a day. Some of my favorite memories of childhood are of watching the sun go down on the Arabian Sea. To this day, I enjoy standing still as the sky darkens and the glow of amber and gold fades away into the dark.”
Visit The Root Connection and Basket Full of Scraps to see more of Sujata’s quilts.
And check out the rest of the book’s parade through the blogosphere…
December 2 Sujata The Root Connection, C&T Teresa Stroin, C&T Lynn Merrill
December 3 LeAnn Decker Nifty Quilts
December 4 Victoria Gertenbach The Silly BooDilly
December 5 Rachaeldaisy Blue Mountain Daisy
December 6 Lori D Humble Quilts
December 7 Casey York The Studio Blog
December 8 Malka Dubrawsky A Stitch in Dye
December 9 Sherry Lynn Wood daintytime
December 10 Bonnie Hunter Quiltville’s Quips & Snips
December 11 Generation Q Magazine
December 12 Jan Burgwinkle Be*mused
December 13 Janet Treen Quiltsalott
Are you ready for a bit of fun? Quilting inspiration comes from lots of places, where does your inspiration come from? Tell us for an opportunity to win a copy of Cultural Fusion Quilts, hard copy in the States of e-book internationally. We’ll hit that random number generator on Friday December 19 to select the winner.