Friday, July 28, 2006

can this fabric be saved?

Remember the feature in Ladies' Home Journal of the 1950's & early 60's- "Can this Marriage be Saved?" Mostly, yes. After all, it was the era of Leave it to Beaver. But I digress... Tonight, continuing to clean house in an effort to figure out what I have here, I have come across some of the world's ugliest fabrics. Quite a few of them are now in the garbage bag - but a few of them are challenging enough for me to take to Lowell and see whether, in fact, they can be saved during my Surface Design Taster workshop. This yellow one is probably beyond help -- but perhaps this next one can be improved by somebody. It looks better in this picture than it really does, so you can imagine! It was commercial ugly fabric that I printed on and then discharged. It got uglier. The third piece is a nauseatingly sweet bubblegum pink salt-dyed piece that somebody must have foisted on me when I wasn't looking. Too ugly to even photograph. Busy weekend ahead and I am leaving for Lowell on Monday unless the stars line up wrong. In the meantime, I shall pick out some other losers and take 'em with me to see if they can be saved. We shall see. I don't think they can get worse.

10 comments:

Deb Hardman said...

Oh what fun! Making something beautiful out of something ugly!
I got to go to the quilt museum in Lowell a few years ago. I really enjoyed it.

I pulled out an old issue of Quilting Arts to look something up that Pat Spiller had mention, & I turned a page & looked at something that made me instantly think "Rayna", so I turned the next page, & there you were! It was your article! I found several names now familiar to me because of blogging. My how small our world is getting!

Cathy Kleeman said...

I'll take that yellow piece, as is. Doesn't need anything, imho. :)

Mary Beth said...

oooooh that yellow piece could be definitely improved - by cutting it up and putting it into a quilt! yummy!

Olga Norris said...

I'm afraid I took up your challenge in a virtual way, and have put the result on my blog.

Gerrie said...

I can't wait until next spring when I get to play with you in Berkeley! will youhave more uglies by then to share with us?

lizzieb said...

well, Rayna, if you can't figure out what to do with them, I sure can!

cfent said...

since nobody seems to want teh gray and turquoise piece i'll take it! it looks like a great backgroudn imho....

Judy said...

well, I was really hoping to be the first one in line for the "yellow ugly"...I LOVE it!!!!

Karoda said...

okay, i've looked at these pieces several times and just can't see the "ugly" in them...I think the one on the bottom can be worked over some but it doesn't repel me or anything.

Melissa said...

Think of the fabrics as "potential". Like Karoda, I couldn't see the ugly in them either. I have used some of my ugly-to-me fabrics as backing fabrics.

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