Oglethorpe Square, 18x40
Oglethorpe Square was inspired by one of the squares in historic downtown Savannah, Georgia when I was there for QuiltCon last February. In Savannah, each square is a green park space with serves as a gathering area for locals and tourists alike. They are beautifully landscaped with trees, flowers, fountains and statues. There are always several park benches too and are a lovely place to pause while walking around. Oglethorpe Square was one that I went to several times while I was there. When I got home from Savannah, I was reminded that the Central Oregon SAQA challenge for this year was "Pathways". I decided this was the perfect theme to highlight this square.
Now, the logical thing to do would have been to make this quilt with a variety of greens to echo those squares in Savannah, but I had this stack of indigos that I've been wanting to use. Some of them are Japanese indigo and they are really lovely, with a variety of textures and shades. You'll notice a variety of colors of blues in the photos which are due to lighting and my tendency to play with Instagram filters. In reality the blues are duller than in most of these photos. The left side photo below is probably the most accurate color-wise.
While I was inspired by a real-life square I didn't try to copy it in any realistic manner. I created several strip sets and cut them up in a liberated manner to create this design. In general, the square did have the four quadrants and two pathways aligned perpendicularly to one another. My favorite bench was in the bottom right quadrant.
Pausing in the middle of machine quilting
Again, I went back to my old standby of 1/4" channel quilting by machine. I usually start by stiching in 1/2 intervals and then going back to create 1/4" spacing.
I created this piece in just a few days as I had a lot on my plate and upcoming 2 weeks of jury service (thankfully, I did not get called in). It was nice to get this project done so I could move on to other things.
Oglethorpe Square will debut in the SAQA special exhibit at the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show on July 8 and may have other showings around Oregon in the next year.
