Crazy patchwork and mosaics

I stumbled on this lovely new place last Saturday. It is a shop dedicated to patchwork and quilting, called The Wandering Line in Purley, Surrey. For a while, I have been thinking how nice it would be to have a very cosy, gorgeous blanket on the couch for us all to snuggle under when we read or watch DVD’s, but I have only ever made a 5 inch square of patchwork and that was when I was 12!

Well, in this shop I saw an example of crazy patchwork and was really drawn to it, so I acted on the moment and signed up for a course last Thursday. It was wonderful and I can see why I was attracted to it as there is a lot of similarity between crazy patchwork and the mosaic making process . It is very intuitive – you move materials around until it feels right so there is a lot of ‘going with the flow’ and letting the materials shape the design. It is very much about using scraps and re-purposing old materials, which is a strong theme in my mosaics. There are two stages to making the patchwork. Firstly is to sew the materials onto a backing fabric and secondly to embellish the squares you create. At this point I had to laugh as the teacher had all the magpie characteristics of a mosaic addict – scouting around for anything shiny and pretty to attach to the work – bells, buttons, beads, ribbons, knicker lace!! Nothing is wasted!

I love my finished square, it is just what I had in mind for our snuggle blanket – only 19 squares to go. Hopefully it will be ready by next winter!