Barb's Elegant Designs - Lectures
Kennewick, Washington         509-396-5718
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Lecture Topics and Descriptions
  • Creating a Focal Point!
    We all want to capture viewers’ attention to our quilts, and an eye catching focal point does just that! Barbara explains what focal points are, why they are used, and how they are created. She shows examples from many of her award winning quilts. Focal Points are very effective tools from the art world, and we quilters can use them to create some of our most wonderful, and eye catching, quilts. You will begin to look at quilts in a whole new way.

  • A Balancing Act: Asymmetrical Designs
    Many art quilts use asymmetrical designs, but can they also work using traditional quilt blocks? Certainly! The trick is Balance - a juggling act to distribute visual weight. This can be done intuitively, but there are some useful guidelines we can use to create the effect we want. Barbara has many examples from her quilts that might shed some light on this balancing act, and stimulate those creative juices!

  • Adding Curves to Quilts
    It’s been said, "There are no straight lines in nature!", so adding curves can create more "reality" in a design, making it appear more organic or natural. Curves can also add interest to the design as a whole, or create more emphasis to selected areas of your quilt. Curves can be added to quilts in a variety of ways, from piecing to quilting to fusing or embellishing, and from actual curves to implied curves. The possibilities are endless!

  • Making a Strong Finish! Creative Borders and Bindings
    So, you’ve completed your quilt top, and you love it! Now what? Do you add a border, or not? What kind of border? Where do you go from here? Do you dare try something unusual or unexpected? Is it worth the effort?
    Yes! Barb brings several examples of quilts with unusual borders, implied borders, and asymmetrical borders. She goes even further, with examples of binding edges that are curved or jagged, and aren’t just the typical squared off straight edge. You may be inspired to step "outside the box", and could gain the confidence you need to try something creative with your next border or binding.
Lecture Fees: 2007:$400, plus expenses.
All lectures are 45-60 minutes in length and include a trunk show of 16-20 of Barb's quilts

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