Hong Kong Quilt

Believe it or not, this quilt was started in Hong Kong thirty years ago.  It came back to the UK as a patchwork top, in a carrier bag from Oliver's of Hong Kong, when its owner and her husband returned after two years there with the British army.

It was pieced by a Chinese lady, partly on a treadle sewing machine, and contains fabrics from dresses belonging to Sandra and her little girls.  For thirty years, it's been in its carrier bag in a wardrobe - until Sandra realised I had a quilting business, and asked me to quilt it for her.

It's a substantial top, not least in size but also in the fabrics used - they aren't all patchwork cotton weight by any means, and some of the seam allowances defeated even my beast of a machine - there was a lot of swerving around the bulkier areas where several points meet!

It also had a rather cavalier attitude to the notion of geometry - nothing was really straight, or perpendicular, or even matched up.

However, what the maker lacked in technical expertise she made up for in the lovely exuberant colours she chose for each tiny hourglass block: it really is a bright and cheery quilt that makes you smile.

This quilt was rather a labour of love.  I had to repair a few patches and re-sew the odd seam before I started.  The quilting pattern I originally chose had to be unpicked because the extra fullness in the quilt top really didn't agree with it, and I needed to re-think, unpick, and then select a pattern that allowed the fullness to go where it would...  The odd angles meant that square corners weren't really an option, so after the go-ahead from Sandra I cut each corner on a curve before binding the edges of the quilt top with a faux-piped binding in complementary fabrics.

Hopefully it won't go back into its carrier bag!