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More Triangle Fun: Pyramids

Lesson 13 from: 10 Ways to Love Improvisational Quilting

Malka Dubrawsky

More Triangle Fun: Pyramids

Lesson 13 from: 10 Ways to Love Improvisational Quilting

Malka Dubrawsky

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Lesson Info

13. More Triangle Fun: Pyramids

Lesson Info

More Triangle Fun: Pyramids

Okay, so now we're going to make some pyramids, which I have I've seen a lot and that, like I said, I don't know that they're called pyramids, that's just but I called them, and they're a little trickier to make because you do have to literally free hand cut these triangles and kind of make them fit together, and I cut a few already, but I'm going to show you how I cut them and, um and you have to it's a really go with the flow kind of pattern it's a realization kind of patterns that we should all take a deep breath and, um, you know, breathing through our nose through our mouse, um, so I'm going to get some white kind of on and get it nicely pressed and just I'm making this the smaller section it's just easier to work with same thing with my black just to make a smaller section that's easier to work with, and I'm not going to be doing these two at a time. They it's really like, you have to cut the first one and you cut the other ones, too, to the first one and then to the second one i...

n the second, you'll see what I'm talking about, so it's it's, it's, um it's more than I saw seles triangle versus these air right triangles um thank goodness I took a geometry on duh so I'm going to cut my first I saw seles triangle so you know this is not the spaces on straight is that could be but it's straight enough let's see one like this and one like this okay, so there's my first little I saw seles triangle and yes, these are not these you know don't break out your you know um compass is because it's not the same angle but that's okay? Because I'm only worried about one side I want to make and I want to give myself a little bit of wiggle room I'd rather make it a little bit too big than a little too small because I can always trim down adding is another story I want to make a triangle that I'm going so on in the opposite direction again here's my other I saw silly side so on in the opposite direction when we saw them together they're going to sew like that, okay? And yes, I realize there's extra better extra than not enough okay, so I'm going to sew them they have one side that's the same cause I use that one side is my is my template of sorts on this is actually really important information for when we do curves believe it or not this whole idea that you can use one piece of cut fabric as the template for a second piece of cut fabric to see I have my first little pyramid combination there and I'm going to press it to one side and just in the interest of things staying you know relatively even I'm gonna trim it I could then trim this the triangle point so that it's you know I don't want to school I don't want to square it off okay I could turn this to down the road this this edge because this is gonna lose it's gonna lose this little bit um but I don't need to right now and then I'm going to do the same thing be better if I did it this way because be less waste um but this time I'm going to do it with the white and just to make it easier for you to take a dissection now so here again I'm using this black as my template of sorts so I've got the angle right now we'll just cut it in the other direction so it on I often flip it over make sure that the angle right yeah at the angle right so it on and then they'll definitely be more training to do I know we did talk about this segment one but just if we have anybody joining us later on you you dont prewashed fabrics for quote projects you know I thought as to why you you avoid um I don't think it has to be avoided it just an unnecessary step my opinion if I was making a garment I would definitely want to watch it happen because uh the the fabric is definitely gonna shrink after you sell it on and you wash it the first time but first of all I like that sizing that the company's kind of put in fabric it makes it nice and stiff that's super stiff it gives it a little bit of stiffness for when I peace with it and and I cut with it and it just makes it easier to work with second of all when I do uh you know uh so wash my quilt and it shrinks around the colt ing stitches it gives it you know ah much more quilty like quality and and I like that so it kind of enhances the very quality I was going for in the first place so I feel like it's to my advantage to just work with unwashed fabric ok so now I got two pyramids and I could keep going I could even used I mean basically re cut the ones that I've got already you know kind of re cut them so that they fit so I won't have to waste the ones that are already cut or start a whole new row um and just make sure again I'm using my just its own triangle as essentially my template for the next one and here since I have so much extra I might want to cut away a little bit yes so it's a little clearer exactly where I should so and I'll trim that as well kind of table there um there you have it and that's how you know here to you could make them in rows um and you know put rose together this one actually is pretty close to the size it needs to be um so one thing I like I really love these because you can kind of play around with I'm going to make one more a black and white and then turn them because I love this kind of pattern you could also make you gets offset them I think yeah, you could offset them a cz well kind of make more of a zigzagging kind of pattern um you could obviously go black and white just has a lot of possibilities. It's of super graphic pattern I think it's great. So I'm going to make a few more at a few mohr and some to the bottom just like you can see how it's how I squared it off I mean basically squared off like cutting it so I'd like to say that I had a really you know, scientific way of doing it on dh and then so those together and there might be there might be some adjust does it need to be made in terms of adding extra fabric but um I got to be honest I don't know if there is I will and if there isn't I won't um so let's go ahead and add another black piece there and I might have cut a black triangle already know didn't look like okay no problem um so go ahead and position that I can use my white here as a template again I feel like I've got maybe it just a hair too much I could have left that on but it's just I will I want to so um I want to know where the seam is supposed to go as much as possible oh I forgot to cut the other the other side of my triangle so easy to start so the triangle on in the wrong direction yeah well so I did you a little trick of laying it down and opening it up to make sure I that's the second time and that's also where like a design walls really helpful because especially if it's like right behind you you know you just reach back there um and you know put it up and over and take it off that is done well as you're working you know all right, so if anybody tried the pyramid do you think oh very nice that's great so I've seen a lot of this kind of pattern me done with a template in like complete fabric lines you know where someone will will take someone's current fabric line on dh do every print it and solid in that line as a pyramid quilt I you know, obviously you could do that with any existing the fabric line but it just I think it's interesting that this particular pattern kind of seems to inspire that mohr than you know I'm talking about allison have you seen that too? Yeah, well, you could use the die cutter too, okay? And so you could cut a whole bunch of once and they would all be perfect, right? But it would be kind of boring. Yes, well and the dealers and stuff for me it would be boring to sell, right? I mean, the deal is that that this is obviously more time intensive in the sense that, you know, you literally have to measure each one, um and make it work, but I think it has a lot more energy and, uh and you can change your mind you're not really measuring with a ruler. No. So I mean, working really well, I think our students actually being amazing and they've created some wonderful things in the first session which we will have a look at later on, but we want to see what you're doing to all of our online student so please take some pictures of the quilting maybe not necessary that you're working on now but maybe you've made in the past because we'd love to see your work just totally state and click on the share your work button and then you can upload from here in the studio and of course malka will be able to see your project as well and we really would love to see those all right? So I'm almost ready to sew my two little columns together so for this one, so if if I wanted to sew these together and have to move this down a bit so you know, I could just basically try in this off and that's the end of my that that squares it off I wanted tio adjust them differently I'd probably squared off and add a little piece which might be kind of interesting to which might be the way I go actually so in terms of squaring off and literally am just squaring enough, I'm getting rid of of the other part of the triangle making it into a right triangle of sorts so now I'm going to have to add something there I still have to add some triangle here in order to finish it, but and and we'll have to add on the other side as well chris actually who's hosting everybody online today in the chat rooms and in social media was asking for the birds of the geese rather would you ever use a rectangle and then add on squares in the side then you don't get the center see that's how I made these okay I condemn of that real quick it's the traditional way of making flying geese I found this to be easier with the improv method because in the traditionally take a rectangle and you have these squares that are cut so that they're basically a half inch I'm not mistaken a half inch uh ah larger than the so you know so let's say you have a six inch side of your rectangle you're going tohave to three and a half by three and a half inch squares and knew the way so then we'll create that diagonal kind of flip up but I could be wrong about the exact measurements but that's basically the idea um but here since you your improv ing it it became a little bit becomes a little bit more complicated and you would you would however eliminate that seem down the middle um a question coming in asking how malcolm to you determine how many squares and blocks you need before you started project is a question of size or is it just you just keep going until you have enough there you go that's the world the joy of improved yeah, well here's the deal it let's say I say to myself, you know, I want to make a quilt to give away a bed quilt a twin size quilt andi you're going to see in a little bit of twin size quote that I did make, uh I just yeah, you just keep making it till it's the right size, you know, just sort of like when you you know, you're making something on the stove and you just keep adding salt until taste, right? No, if you're on a salt free diet, you might wanna take that haven't salt you put in there all right? So there's that and I'm gonna square it off a swell, all right? And I'm gonna put put these two guys together and decided to go ahead and matchup, but rather than do kind of like a, I could do that and I would have them basically, you know, they would basically be done, but I actually want them to meet at their little point, so I'm gonna add fabric floats to the top and bottom to the top of this one in the bottom of that one, and we'll put them together ok, so it's one purple at the bottom of this one and trim that to fit this trip is over, I mean here's an issue well, here's it's something to think about I could because I want him to fit a certain way they're awfully close to each other in terms of ed shape um so I don't know that I'm not going to go ahead and cut, you know, lay them one over the other like this and make sure that it's an exact fit I think I can I could think I can just I can just wing that and I'm going to we'll see what happens like I did earlier when I did a friend a seam because of curves that one scene matched another are followed another here tio I'm going to kind of make my way down the seen slowly stopping the kind of three adjust I could pin this ahead of time um the only time I absolutely always pin is is when I do curved and when we talk about those you'll definitely see that pinning is is a necessity I can't imagine doing those without without pinning and he so and here we go there's our our, um are diamonds are former pyramids now diamonds and yes, I mean they didn't they they matched up in terms of like this line, but they did magic up exactly, but you know it's not something that I'm gonna even concern myself with um smooth flat fabric do you need to take into account the grain of the fabric when you are cutting your doing triangles well, you're going to get some bias because because you're cutting on some degree of bias eso there is going to be some movement the nice thing is since you're actually making the next triangle based on the previous triangle um you can adjust for that so I think it actually makes it in some ways easier than if you cut them all ahead of time I mean, they're all based on a template and they may you know, it it's sort of like when you feeling woodworking and they say rather than make the next cut based on some kind of measurement if you need to be this exact same sizes the plank you cut a minute ago use that plank as you're measuring tool, so because yes, maybe ideally it needs to be six feet wide but you might have cut it, you know, just a hair short of six feet and that could make a difference so in a way, this makes it a little easier to peace because you're not measuring it may not basing it on just a set template you're basing it on the actual piece that just happened the actual piece that you just cut um okay and so there you have it that I would point out that this would be a great place to do some strip piecing, you know, to like strip piece uh the the diamonds even on ly one side like let's say you tell you in place of these black I'm going to strip piece some colors and then cut that to the shape and cut it might it would be yeah, it be easier than doing both of those like if you strip piece the whites and the blacks, whatever you're going to substitute for the whites and the blacks though it would be a little harder to put all that together, you know? But if you decide ok, we'll have a solid of some sort of solid meeting, you know, not create out of strip piecing um ah background and then I'm gonna strip piece these what is what we're calling our black triangles? Um, I think that that would be a really, really great effect, another segment I'm going to show you all kind of black and white versace something that's all about strip pacing in terms of, you know, seeing the two and, uh yeah, I think it would be a really terrific effect. Um, so let me talk to you. So based on that suggestion, I'll just kind of briefly cut what I would have the traditional one is done, and you can kind of get an idea of how that would work if you choose to go that route there's a little bit more um finn eagling for lack of a better word that has to be done and that's why I opted to do it to do it this way to do it with a half square triangles because I felt like that the niggling was a little a little hard in the improvisational world um so you start off with this rectangle and then you're going to need squares that actually are overlap each other by a quarter inch on each side at least I mean, in a traditional pattern that's how much they overlap each other so it needs to be needs to be the same height is that square was that rectangle and that they'll overlap some because what you're going to do is you're going to so I'm going to sew from this diagonal aiken market even where's my little one status like in market thiss and then when I saw that I'm going to flip it up and it's going to it's going to make that half of my of the geese um since it's not a perfect square and this is not a perfect rectangle it's not going to make the same kind of of it's not gonna work the same way that it would if these were measured um bids so you're gonna want to trim off this excess you know needed and then you open it up and you've got one half of your flying east block and now you need to go ahead and create the other half this is a good sony's over lab ok now I'm going tio draw a line this way so that when I sew it I could bring it in a little bit when I sew it again I'm gonna have that that's your flying geese and it has no seemed down the middle and actually now that I folded it I don't actually even need to draw it I could just use that fold is my guide and it also tell me that if I speak it in a little bit get a little more accurately all right there we go so I'm going to sew along my little hold that I created there and trim that excess away and open up and yes I've got a flying geese bloc without the same down the middle so that is certainly a way to make them it just takes a little bit more it takes a little bit more measuring based on what you've got already takes a little more a little more fun eagling I guess is the word I used on I'm going to stand by that word um and uh no that's the perfect yeah that's a great word um and ah so yes you could definitely make them that way um and here too you could definitely make them bigger you make those base rectangles bigger and you got to make those squares bigger and it could be a bigger print. And it, too, would be very dramatic.

Class Materials

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10 Ways to Love Improvisational Quilting - Look Book
20 Favorite Resources

Ratings and Reviews

Me F
 

Another great class. I love the approach that encourages spontaneity and decision-making throughout the process! I was not at all put off by Malka's speaking style -- I found her informative, articulate, thoughtful and funny. I would, however, have appreciated much less time watching her sew, although I realize she likely did that in this class to allow her in-person students to have time as well. A bit tedious, however, when it's not live or you're not sewing along. I loved the idea from another reviewer to have samples of Malka's quilts hanging in the studio throughout all the sessions so we could refer to a finished piece that demonstrated the skill she was teaching. I would recommend this course to anyone who loves quilting or wants to learn.

user-5fbbc1
 

It was interesting to see how Malka goes about improv piecing and making her design choices. She makes visually interesting quilts with wonderful use of color. On the down side: 1.Technical issues need to be worked out. Chat did not work for me. I use Apple products. 2.Malka needs to find alternatives to "um" and "kind of". The course was too long. We do not need to watch Malka sewing so much...some is ok. More samples partially done would cut way down on sewing time. I would prefer to see examples of Malka's work hanging on the walls behind her, so we could see where she was going with her demos and give us some fabulous quilts to admire. I believe the sewers on the set would also have benefited from seeing samples hanging on the walls.

Sarah H
 

I have only watched one session, as I live in the UK and I did not watch it live. I have a busy schedule at present so will take awhile to work though them, initial thoughts were very good, I do like Malka's engery and free use of pallet. I look forward to watching them over the coming weeks and get back to you. I do like the concept of these classes and find them very useful. Thanks

Student Work

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