Knitted Star Quilt - using Starry fabrics

Written by Brittany Lloyd

Ruby Star Society produces some of my very favorite fabrics! Specifically, their "basic" collections are really great fabrics that mix well with a wide variety styles. I've made a few quilt using some of their basics and I just love how timeless they are...with a little bit of edge! If you haven't seen my Ruby Star Society Knitted Star quilt or my Rhythm quilt, be sure to click through and see what I mean!

So you can imagine my excitement when I saw this new "Starry" collection by Alexia Marcelle Abegg for the first time! My mind was instantly swirling with ideas! At the time, I was itching to make another Knitted Star quilt, so I played around with a few mock-ups and decided that this was the winner!

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I decided to choose fabrics that gave me sort of a 90's autumn vibe, if that makes sense. The red and oranges and gold are really the focal colors of the group, but the sea foam and purple add a nice little pop that makes me think of "Saved by the Bell." haha

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From left to right, the fabrics are:

Saddle
Warm Red
Papaya
Warm Peach
Posy
Dark Peony
Soft Aqua
Frost

For the background, I used another new basic....Sugar in Buttercream. The Sugar collection by Sarah Watts is another recent favorite of mine. I love how dainty and random those little dots are! I don't think the collection is set to release until January 2022, so if you didn't want to wait until then, any soft neutral would work great!

We have a limited supply of 8 piece fat quarter bundles available in our shop.... click here!

I did a "mix and match" technique for my last Knitted Star quilt (the Pink & Purple one) and I absolutely love how it turned out. So I did that with these fabrics too. It was fun to play around with different combinations based on color and value. I tried to create an even mix of warm and cool colors, as well as light and dark fabrics. So if you are looking at the pattern, the Part A fabrics are one color, then the Part B fabrics are another. Then the cornerstones for the sashing pieces within the blocks are a third color. It takes a little bit of thought and organization when you're separating everything out but once you figure out which pieces go where, it's smooth sailing!

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You can tell that I was a little distracted when I made a few of these blocks. A few squares in my Part A sections in the corners got a little mixed up, but in the end I decided to leave it. After all, it does add a little bit of character. :) A few people on Instagram said that it's like the snowflakes are dancing or blowing in the wind.

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And here are all of the blocks together! I don't normally recommend using prints with this pattern, just because the strips are so narrow, it normally chops everything up too much making it a bit chaotic. However, these stars are small-scale enough that it really works out nicely!

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Once again, I also decided to use my Background fabric as the Cornerstones. I feel like this really makes the stars stand out from the negative space.

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I sent my quilt top one of my long-time pattern testers, Sarah of Stitch Mode Quilts. She's quilted for me before and I was really excited to have her quilt for me again! Her communication and willingness to collaborate were really top-notch. I highly recommend checking her out!

When I initially submitted my "quilting request" form on her website, she quickly followed up with me and we started chatting about quilting designs and thread colors. We ultimately ended up choosing Crystal Ball by Karlee Porter Design.

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For the backing, I went with Alexia Abegg's other basic collection, Add it Up. She just released some new colors, so I went with the "Earth" shade. That's always my go-to color when I'm indecisive about things. It's totally a neutral in my book. :)

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It also seemed easiest just to make it my binding as well. It ties in both the front and the back of the quilt, so I'm a fan! I used a caramel colored thread to blend in with the binding fabric. Ya'll know how much I love to machine bind...it's just so quick and easy! If you haven't seen my Machine Binding Tutorial, you can find that here.

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We brought this quilt with us to our annual fishing trip with my dad. We stay on campus at an old fort that has been turned into a conference center. Fun fact.... this is actually where Peter and I got married! It's always a lot of fun to roam around and explore the old brick structures and see what kind of photos we can take. I really liked this spot because the lighting really makes the texture on the quilt pop!

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Thanks for reading about my latest Knitted Star quilt! I think this is a pattern that I will continue to revisit year after year....so you'll see more of these in my future. :) Check out the links below to find the pattern and fat quarter bundle if you're interested!

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LINKS:

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Happy Sewing!

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Brittany

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