22. Learn the Basics of Trapplique – Part 1

Yay! It’s finally time to teach you a super cool technique called Trapplique!

I mentioned way back in January that details on this technique would be shared sometime this year because I’ve been wanting to play with it for quite some time. The technique itself and the name comes from my friend Nina Paley, who got into quilting back in 2011 and knocked my socks off by creating the most awesome technique combining trapunto and applique together in one go!

Now for reference, let’s see Express Your Love BEFORE trapplique covered up all those dark breath spaces:

This is actually an older shot from last month. Turns out I didn’t take a photo right before trapplique because I was so excited to see what she would look like with the pieces in place.

One important tip to remember is that the breath sections are all “on top” of the background and even the goddess body, so technically all these spaces need to be filled first. I’m kind of getting ahead of myself a bit, but we will sort it all out by the end!

Now the AFTER shot:

Granted, this did take a lot of time. And it’s not the easiest quilt design to start trappliqueing up a storm with because so many pieces over and underlap each other. My one suggestion after doing this whole thing is to use only 1 color of fabric for all the breath. That way you at least won’t have to change thread colors as you satin stitch around the edges.

Now I got a bit chatty in this video because I wanted to explain a bit about where we’re going with this technique, why I love it so much, and so on and so forth. Just stick with it as I do…eventually…show you the first step of this technique!

So that’s the first step! Mark the sections you want to trapplique on fabric, baste with 1 layer of batting (no backing), quilt the outline, then quilt something within if you like.

Cut out the pieces carefully, making sure to leave just a bit extra where a piece will be overlapped. I kind of forgot that step on some pieces, but it still worked out okay. Gotta love the way fabric can shift and the power of a wide satin stitch!

Now in the next video we’ll chat about auditioning fabric colors. That choice of gold above for her body was actually a tricky decision and I’d like to show you how it came about.

The next video will be on using the built in alphabets in your machine to stitch the phrases, then FINALLY we will finish up in video #25 with trapplique part 2.

So this month might be a bit of back and forth. Understand that if you don’t completely understand what I’m talking about NOW, you might in a few videos. Always test and sample an idea first so it makes more sense. I think the first time I read Nina’s blog about trapplique I was left thinking “huh?” but after stitching it out, it definitely works and is super, super cool.

Let’s go quilt,

Leah