Verdance Edge-to-Edge Digital Quilting Design

Introducing our latest digital pantograph design: Verdance. The name is a play on the word verdant, which means green with grass or other rich vegetation. With its leaf motifs, Verdance will add a touch of nature-inspired curves to any quilt.
 


The main feature of the design started with the concept that leaves traveling in opposite directions would form a cute little orange peel. Originally, the larger circles were smaller and empty inside. Actually, the leaves were uniform in size, as were the orange peels and the blank circles. As I stitched out this first iteration, I didn't even get halfway through the first row when I decided to stop and re-work the design.

With the first try, I had to bump up the scale so that the leaves wouldn't be annoyingly small, but doing so made the circles too large for my liking, especially with nothing inside of them. I adjusted the size of all the leaves to create a subtly staggered effect, and I also enlarged the circle to add a decorative flourish inside. The changes to the overall shape of the design resulted in rows that nest more effectively together when offset, rather than everything being uniform.



I hope that the result looks balanced and harmonious. I stitched it out in typical rows as you would any edge-to-edge design, but I think it would also look charming with a quilt loaded sideways, so the motifs appear vertical upon completion.

In other words, this would work as a multi-directional design.



Verdance is versatile and complements a wide range of quilt styles. Its organic motifs pair beautifully with both modern and traditional quilts, adding a touch of nature-inspired charm. Whether you're working on a floral-themed quilt or looking to add some movement to a geometric design, Verdance would work great!

The Quilt

Quilt Pattern

The pattern I used for this quilt is called Plus Pop by Quilty Love. I felt pretty special getting early access to the pattern because I was going to be seeing the designer, Emily Dennis, at an upcoming retreat. Without buying any special fabrics, I was able to quickly pull fabrics and cut out all my pieces in just a few short hours. It really helped that I had a bolt of the silvery Kona color to use as the plus fabric. It made the cutting even more efficient and gave my version a cohesive look.

It's fast and fun to whip out block after block with minimal seams and quickly get to the lay-out stage.

Fabrics

As I mentioned, I didn't buy any fabrics especially for this quilt, though I had purchased some good multi-purpose bundles like the Starry bundle I got from Megan at Blue Ridge Quilt Co. I'd also picked up a fat quarter bundle of Besties by Tula Pink that I didn't have any specific plans for, so I used the two lines prominently and threw in other matching prints, just for fun.

The Backing

Silver Dapple Dots by Riley Blake on repeat! At some point in time, I'm going to need to seam together the big remnants left over after the last several lap-sized quilts I've made. Since the fabric is a wide back (108"), I've had somewhere around ~40" x ~70" fabric pieces leftover after trimming. But this quilt was not the project where any additional piecing was done. I was in a hurry! I'll save that job for another day. 😇

 

The Quilting Details

Difficulty Level

I gave this design an "easy" rating in terms of difficulty to use. It is a bit dense when stitched at the dimensions I used, and there is some backtracking. So, it may take a little more time than other designs, but the alignment is very easy.

You'll want to offset every other row by 50% when you're getting this ready to stitch out with your software. After you offset the rows, decrease the gap slightly so the rows will nest with the surrounding rows.

If you'd like to view the stitch path, a video is available at the top of the blog post that demonstrates its progression.

Scale

When scaled at the dimensions given below, the size of the small orange peel is about 1 7/8" in diameter, and the large circle (with the petal motif inside) is about 3 1/4" in diameter.

Here are the sizing specifications for how I set up this quilt using my Intelliquilter (64" x 64" quilt size):

Row height: 3"
Gap: -0.33" 
Pattern height: 3.33" (measurement from top to bottom of the repeat)
Offset: 50%
Backtracking: some

Here's a look at the included PDF:

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