The idea behind this quilt is quite simple, I have actually been surprised that I haven’t seen it more often in a scrappy quilt. I was inspired by my own quilt where I did it on the border of this one. Here.

As you know, I had a lot of second-hand green fabrics that I had wanted to use up but they were so really quite unspectacular that I was stumped for a bit.

I decided to try this idea but with a coin quilt. In other words, the whole thing was made of graduated coins. But I couldn’t just make them the same all across the quilt - in other words, all lights at the top or darks at the top. I thought that might look bad. Or maybe boring.

I decided to alternate light and dark and work that way.

What I was was just cut a bunch of 2.5”x6.5” strips because I had a 6.5” ruler and it was easy to do.

I then took them and sorted them from light to dark and then made stacks from the lights, mediums and darks. I then made sure I had some of each - light, med and darks into 10 different pile.

Once I had each stack of strips, I went ahead and tried to organize the strips from light to dark. Then I sewed them together.

I knew that maybe it wouldn’t be perfect in every case, as I was using all kinds of different prints and fabrics. However, I did the best I could. But I didn’t get the effect I wanted until I flipped them alternately. Then, I was actually surprised at how much I liked it.

As you look at this from a distance, the fabrics actually look very blah - even ugly or maybe “ordinary” would be the better word.

I think when I show you up close, you can see what I mean. Individually, they really are unremarkable. I think each time I look at it I am surprised with the effect that can be created by simply putting the strips in order of shade - at least OVERALL from light to dark. I wasn’t perfect in my construction/decision making, but it worked anyway.