The Dryad Collection by Shannon Brinkley

Today I am thrilled to be a stop on the blog hop for Shannon Brinkley’s Dryad fabric collection with Fabri-Quilt. I first met Shannon because of our shared love of appliqué–her first book with Stash Books came out just before mine, and once I was aware of it and her unique collaged appliqué technique, I knew I had to meet her. Shannon’s new fabric collection is also informed by her love of appliqué, and comes complete with a focal print that mimics her collaged technique.

I also had the pleasure of being on the blog tour for Shannon’s book, Scrappy Bits Appliqué,  for which I made a project using her collage technique. This technique informs her fabric collection, which comprises various prints and colorways that work harmoniously together. Tonal prints are one of my favorite types of fabrics to work with, and Dryad offers them in abundance. As I worked with the collection, one of the things I noticed was the variation in hues among the prints, which lends depth and interest to any composition that incorporates all of them.

I’d had an idea for a quilt floating around in my head for a while, and when Shannon approached me to make a project featuring her Dryad collection, it was apparent that this was the perfect design. I worked with a Snack Pack of 2.5″ strips of her fabrics, which allowed me to piece the fabrics that I would use for the appliqued leaves, lending additional interest and movement to the final quilt design. I quilted the quilt with a woodgrain pattern, as suggested by Shannon’s focus on trees throughout her collection. This was my first attempt at this free motion quilting motif, and I’m tremendously happy with how it turned out.

Having selected many, many fabrics for appliqué, I can say with confidence that Shannon’s tone-on-tone prints are perfectly suited to this…er…application. And as a thank you for reading along, you can find this out for yourself, as Fabri-Quilt is giving away a bundle of Dryad fabrics to a lucky reader. For this giveaway, Fabri-Quilt would like you to sign up to follow their blog, Inspired by Fabric. Once you’ve signed up, comment here to be entered in the drawing. Entries will be open until midnight on Friday, Feb. 12, and I’ll announce the winner on Saturday, February 13.  This blog hop also offers other chances to win, including a copy of Shannon’s book and a collection of Aurifil threads that coordinate with her fabrics, so make sure you check out the other stops on the hop!

2/2 Shannon Brinkley, The Bottle Tree

2/3 Fabri-Quilt, Inspired by Fabric

2/4 Angela Walters, Quilting is My Therapy

2/5 Aurifil

2/8 Casey York, The Studiolo

2/9 C & T Publishing

2/10 Rebecca Bryan, Bryan House Quilts

2/11 Stacey Day, Stacey in Stitches

2/12 Kristi Schroeder, Initial K Studio