Last January I took Rob Appell's Color Strata class with my guild. Then the project remained in its project box until I added it to my UFO Challenge sheet in position #6 and it was chosen for January for the APQ UFO Challenge. My strata were all pieced in class, using a Kona roll-up of Christa Watson's Designer Palette. This month I've taken it from six pieced panels to a finished (and basted) nearly twin sized quilt top. Quilting is underway, but I wanted to share my January progress. I'm thrilled with how far it's come. And I look forward to finishing it up and submitting it to my guild quilt show.
I cut my strata sections into 6 1/2" wide strips (I have a few leftover strips for some future project... it's like my UFO birthed another UFO). At this point I played with them on my design wall and ultimately decided to use two strips in each column, connecting the green ends.
The original strata (see top picture) is built with three different widths of pieces which leads to a variety of sizes in the finished panels. I used this in my design by building out from the longest section in the center.
I had originally purchased three yards of the blue fabric for the class. I wish I'd bought more, but I was wary of buying additional fabric from a different dye lot. In the end, the limited amount of blue added to my challenge. I drew out a sketch to scale and then calculated the yardage required for my design. I had to redesign slightly to get it under 3 yards. The redesign simply made the long skinny vertical pieces of blue narrower. The trickiest part of the project was cutting these 2 3/4" x 95" pieces of fabric!
As I worked on piecing my columns, I really liked this intermediate step where all the strata touched. It may inspire a new project to use my leftover bits.
The title, No Purple, came from my surprise at how many different colors are in this quilt, yet none of my favorite color. That sure doesn't happen very often. Here's the finished quilt top.
The backing is pieced and quilting is underway. I shopped my stash and found these two fabrics to use for the backing.
Thank you for visiting! I'm looking forward to seeing which UFO off my list I'll be working on in February.
I'm linking up to the January OMG Finish post.
The pattern is Puzzle Box by Tracey Brookshier. The AWESOME purple ninja fabric is by 
