Patchwork

I was sewing some fabric together yesterday, making a curtain for my living room and it got me thinking...

Patchwork, I've always loved it. Don't be thinking about those little shapes of flowery cotton painstakingly hand sewn on bits of paper... I don't know anything about that other than it looks like a lot of very hard work... No, I'm talking about sewing lots of different fabrics together. The first proper clothes I made, back in the late 80's was a red and purple patchwork coat for a friend and various patchwork mini skirts for myself. I don't have any photos from that time, just a patchwork of memories and of course, memories of patchwork ;-) then I went on to make lots more patchwork clothes... This is me sometime in the late 90's and early 2000's (don't those huge red clown shoes just scream 90's!)

I got the chance to let my passion for patchwork run riot about 4 years ago when I was commissioned to decorate a bedroom in Görvälnsslott (castle) just outside Stockholm. There were severe limitations on what could be done because it was a listed building, so we had to leave the walls as they were and just work with it... I made a patchwork bedspread, curtains and curtain top box thingy, cushions and chair covers for the on-suite room...

We all know that there was a huge trend for patch work furniture a few years ago but I don't really care if that trend has peaked, I don't give a damn about what other people like. I've always loved patchwork and I'm always going to.

Here is a lovely picture I found on Pinterest with a bit of proper old skool patchwork on the wardrobe with a gorgeous patchwork chair. I love it when you have a fairly minimalistic room with a few key colourful pieces...                                                              Hmmmm..this one is a bit mad even for me!

But it doesn't have to be fabric patchwork, how about a crazy boho bathroom with a patchwork of wallpapers? I must confess that although I like the look, I can just see this looking so shabby after a short time, with lots of little curled up edges...especially the way I do wall paper hanging, I have a very rock n roll approach to glue distribution and bubble removal... Let's just leave it at that ;-)

The thing about doing patchwork well, is that you have to have a huge amount of bits of fabric to choose from. If you are only going to do a small project, it's not very economical. But, if you are a life long patchwork addict like me, and have a stock of fabric remnants that could sink a ship, then the possibilities are endless!