February 4, 2025
So you have a beautiful grouping of fabric, all from the same designer's line. You can use any of them together in your quilt, right? After all, they are designed to work together, and to match beautifully.

But maybe it's not all about color, maybe there are a couple other things we should be thinking about. Let's talk about a few things to take into consideration that will make subtle differences in our quilts.
The scale of the prints can play an important role. I'm sure we've all heard that small, little pattern pieces will be better suited to a small scale print, and to save the larger scale prints for larger pieces. Look at these little 9-patches. The first one is utilizing a large scale print that is wasting the beautiful design as they almost don't even look like the pieces are from the same fabric. Can't you picture the larger print as a center in a large star block or as border? In those settings you would get to see the beauty of the pattern design. The second one is able to show the entire design of the fabric even in these tiny pieces because of the small scale of the design.

So now what if we are thinking about making some pinwheels? I think a burgundy and a green fabric would look great in these pinwheels. Not all burgundies and greens are equal in this case. Although any two from this collection would technically "go together" they may not bring the block to life. This has to do with the value of the colors.
Color value refers to the lightness or darkness of a color. It describes how much light that particular color will reflect. In the top part of the picture below I've laid out three fabrics. We can visually see the difference in the burgundy and the green, so they should look great in a pinwheel. But when I change the picture to black and white, we see that the value of those two fabrics are very similar.

Now, I'm going to replace the green fabric with a lighter shade of green for you to compare.

Now we have a better contrast as the lighter shade is reflecting more light. So let's look at the pinwheels made from both pairs of fabric.

Up close, there is some distinction in the pinwheel on the top but when we zoom out and look at a distance we can hardly even tell there are two fabrics in that block. That's because the color value is similar and neither one is reflecting much light. However, the pinwheel on the bottom has distinction even at a distance. Here are two other blocks made with these fabrics.

The final thing I want to mention today is about how "busy" a quilt can become. Now don't get me wrong, there are some quilt patterns or designs that are specifically designed to have that busy look and if that is the look you are going for then that's great. But this is where scale can also come into play. In the picture below, the top portion has 5 prints that are very similar in scale, I would probably call it a medium scale. As you look across the row it appears "busy". In the bottom row I replaced a couple of the medium scale prints with a small scale and a large scale fabric. Our eyes now have a place to settle and rest. Even the large scale fabric makes our eyes stop and take in the complete design merely because it stands out from the other fabrics in scale. These fabrics will also have that effect in your quilt top. It's even interesting to note that in the top picture, although I would class them all as medium scale, the two on each end have a little more empty space and when looking only at the top row of fabric, your eye will settle on those with the more open space.

Of course none of these so-called rules are carved in stone, and there are always exceptions. If you have neglected to think about some of these things in your finished quilts that doesn't mean they look horrible. These are just subtle things to look at when picking out your fabrics that may change a "cute" little quilt into a quilt that actually "sings".
So dig out some of your stash and play around if you haven't considered some of these points before, and have fun!
Great information Twyla - thanks
I enjoy expanding my quilting knowledge via you sharing yours. Thank you. Sharon A Burchell, Northesst Margaree
Great article with some very helpful information,thank you.
Nice post looking forward to your next one.
good article