Split Level Quilt in QuiltCon Magazine

I’m thrilled to share today that I have a quilt pattern in the just-released QuiltCon Magazine! The magazine is available digitally, and print copies will be available soon.

This quilt is called Split Level, and the design was inspired by the mathematical concepts of exponential growth and decay. The block segments are either doubled or halved from the blocks in adjacent rows, which gives the whole quilt a fun and graphic look.

This simple quilt has a bit more history than you might expect! It began as one of my repeat patterns from my #100daysofsaroypatterns project in 2017, and I mocked it up in 2018 as an option for the two-color challenge that was part of QuiltCon 2019. I never made the two-color version, but would occasionally come back and revisit the design. I added and subtracted strip sets, rotated them around, and tried out several different configurations of the same basic idea — doubling and halving pieces from row to row.

Early in 2020, I mocked it up in this blue/green/yellow color palette as an idea for one of the Modern Quilt Guild’s Modern Monthly patterns. I also submitted my Ribbons quilt at that time, and they chose to go with that pattern for last year’s June Quilt of the Month.

When submissions for QuiltCon Magazine opened, I decided to give it another try. I sent them this design in a totally different color palette — green, red, and gold — and then, almost as an afterthought, included the mockup of the blue/green/yellow version too. I’m glad I did, because that’s the one they chose!

(I even bought the fabric for the green/red/gold version, with the intention of making the quilt regardless of whether it got into the magazine. I had to pivot to this colorway instead, but making the green/red/gold version is still on my list!)

I made this quilt in October, just before getting my longarm, so the straight line quilting was done on my domestic machine. The piecing provided a perfect guide for all those vertical lines!

The backing was made from six 1/2-yard cuts of Alison Glass’s Handcrafted Indigo collection. I’d had these fabrics in my stash for a few years now, and they were perfect as a fun backing for this quilt. I even had enough left over to make a matching hanging sleeve!

Pick up a copy of QuiltCon Magazine and you can make your own! The magazine also has a lot of other great content — 9 other patterns, plus articles, plus a gallery of selected quilts from the upcoming virtual show. Enjoy!

The stats:

• Measures ~48″ by 60″.
• Fabrics are Kona Cotton in Wasabi, Cypress, Robin Egg, Malibu, Surf, and Nightfall.
• Backing is Alison Glass Handcrafted Indigo.
• Binding is Kona Cotton in Nightfall.
• Quilted on my domestic machine with a walking foot with Aurifil 40 wt thread in #1320 (Bright Teal).