Many years ago, Margreta participated in Q-xchg an exchange of fabric and blocks that was part of the e-mail list, Quiltnet. One of the exchanges was to make and receive Mariner's Compass blocks.

Margreta made this block for the exchange:

In exchange, Margreta received four other compass blocks. Through a friend, she received one other compass block. So, now she had six blocks and didn't know what to do with them.

Then, Margreta read Design Your Own Quilts by Judy Hopkins. A light bulb went off. For a different quilt, Margreta had accumulated a few embroidered sailboat blocks. On a trip to Washington state, she found an interesting Japanese inspired fabric with wood blocks by Hokusai.

The initial layout was designed. While the quilt has six blocks, Margreta modified the Blueprint 12 in Judy's book to work for this quilt. Like Blueprint 12C, she did have 2 smaller theme blocks in the top right. Instead of three blocks in the bottom left, Margreta planned four blocks, to help balance the addition of the extra Mariner's Compass block. Since the Mariner's Compass blocks are 12 inches, Margreta modified the 4 inch scale to a 6 inch scale for the filler blocks.

Because the Mariner's Compass blocks use a variety of colors, but all have some blue. Margreta began collecting a variety of blue fabrics that were different tones and textures and included other colors to some degree.

Margreta's Step One simple blocks were three designs: solid squares,  the hourglass and the four patch. The hourglass blocks were a variety of lights to darks. The four patches were a few lights and a few darks. Her Step Two blocks were pinwheels and four patch within a four patch. Her pinwheels were largely mediums to darks. Her four patch within a four patch were lights to mediums. At this point, Margreta's small design wall was too small so she laid out the quilt in progress on the floor.

Then Margreta needed to fill in the design. For Step Three, she made some half square triangles in using lights, mediums and darks. She also added a few more solid squares. For Step Four, she made a few more pinwheels and some Bird in the Windows. To finally fill things in, she made a couple of hourglasses, a modified pinwheel and a few more four patches.

After completing the bulk of the top, Margreta needed to figure out borders. Because there was a very yellow compass in the blocks, she added yellow to the border. For the yellow to stand out against some of the light areas, she added first a small dark blue border. Then she continued some of the angles of color by fracturing the outer border.

The quilt measures 80 inches by 92 inches.

Quilt in private collection.

Would you like more on this topic? Write me at mks@margreta.com.