Esterita Austin Hand-Painted Quilt Class

Let’s talk about inspiration. I wanted to get back into my sewing and quilting. A friend on Facebook had shared her gorgeous Passionfruit Hawaiian quilt design and I had asked her to keep me posted on upcoming classes at The Maui Quilt Guild. Last week Esterita Austin presented Four Bowls and Spoons, a class using hand-dyed fabrics and batiks enhanced with paints to create quilt tops in a two-day class on Maui.  

Esterita has been published worldwide and also appeared on the Sally Jesse Rafael show.  

What an exciting way to jump start my creativity.   

The two-day workshop began with about a dozen women meeting and setting up our supplies on our own long tables.  

Setting up our supplies

Esterita provided the kit which included the pattern, transfer paper, misty fusible which was used to adhere the fabric and the parchment paper (used to iron inside of, to prevent the Misty fuse from ruining the iron or other materials).  

As you can see, Esterita had supplies available for purchase which are also available at her website. www.esteritaaustin.com She began with an introduction about herself and showed us the beautiful book, Under The Tuscan Sun, that had been created for her at the workshop she teaches in Italy. Fabulous story of cooking, quilting and dining in a villa for a week.  

She once taught in Spain to women that didn’t speak a word of English. All they needed to know was “Good” or “No way” in reference to whether or not a fabric would work. We laughed often at her witty comments and easy going teaching style.  

We used gorgeous Batiks and hand-dyed fabrics to compose our quilt tops. We layered stacks of beautiful fabrics then cut our first pattern piece to reveal an opening in which to lay over our fabric and visualize how the lights and darks would work most effectively. By flipping through the pile you could see which fabric popped.  

By cutting out sections and placing them back on the pattern, we were able to view what the finished piece would be. As we cut our shapes, we also cut a piece of Misty Fuse material and ironed the pieces within parchment paper to adhere.  

It was so exciting to watch everyone’s bowls appear. All the cut fabrics were placed on a black background fabric then fused with the hot iron to complete the project. Some of us added borders of stripes or complimenting batiks. I chose to create a mitered border and one of the girls, Shana helped me with that.  

Shana ironing her black background.  

Shana’s piece.  It’s amazing…  

Donna fusing her bowls onto the background.  

Day Two: We painted

After all the tops were assembled we watched Esterita demonstrate how she enhances the bowls to bring out the highlights and the darks to really make it pop.  We taped our quilt tops to the walls and everyone got to work painting on their own piece. What a wonderful sight to see all these ladies painting on quilts.  

This is my piece getting ready to be painted…and below is my piece painted…  

Voila,  

Now it’s time to take it to the sewing machine. I’ll post again when my quilt is complete.  

It was a  fabulous class.  

Be sure and check out the Maui Quilt Guild for upcoming classes and sign up for one. You don’t have to be a member to participate. Maybe  you are visiting and would like to enjoy meeting some really great women. I truly enjoyed this.  

~ Marilyn  

www.amaryllisofhawaii.com

August 5, 2010 | Categories: Classes, Maui, Painting, quilts, sewing, Uncategorized | 2 Comments