Instructor

Color plays a pivotal role in MJ Kinman’s gem quilts. Over the past 25+ years she’s learned ways to approach color confidence and is delighted to share these ideas with you. This is a hands-on workshop, full of experimentation, to help you gain color confidence. Begin the day getting to know the color wheel. Learn how our brains crave harmony and why certain color combinations satisfy that craving. Move beyond basic color theory to exploring how a color can change simply by being placed to other colors. Using strips and squares of solid fabric, you’ll learn how to create sparkle with value contrast and how to make quilts glow with saturation contrast. MJ will also show you how to create effective transparencies and how to achieve the illusion of fabric sliding over and under one another. Finally, she’ll show you how to change the appearance of a color just by changing its neighboring hue. For those who want to sew during the workshop, we’ll take time to assemble strips into blocks of concentric squares, similar to the design used by Josef Albers in his series Homage to the Square. Why are these concepts important? MJ wants to help you demystify the use of color, gain the confidence in your color selection, and create brilliant quilts, regardless of your inspiration.

Students will have the opportunity to sew their experiments together to capture the various effects they’ve been studying.

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This brand-new workshop shows you how to create sparkling gems in a whole new way. Use the power of improvisational piecing to create glowing gems without using dozens of small freezer paper templates. Learn how to use improvisational strip-piecing techniques and basic shapes to create emerald-cut, baguette-cut, and Asscher-cut diamonds. These diamonds feature long, lovely facets – the “hall of mirrors” that show off the interior clarity of a gem. During the workshop, MJ talks about color selection for gems. (hint: there is no wrong answer!), shows you how to make your gem sparkle with value contrast and glow with saturation contrast. Finally, she discusses simple assembly techniques to piece together your lovely creation.

Activities include:

• Creating a color palette that brings you joy
• Playing with high-value contrast and saturation contrast to incorporate sparkle and glow into your gem
• Strip piecing the interior facets of your gemstone
• Assembling the strip-pieced facets to create your own unique gemstone

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