The Ghastlies Quilt: quilt a wickedly fun web for Halloween

After creating something personal and practical with Lucy Garvin’s It’s ‘Purse’ onal purse last week, I’m trading pretty accessories for something a little more wickedly fun!

Are you a Halloween fan? If spooky fabrics, quirky characters, and a touch of dark humor make you smile, The Ghastlies Quilt by Nicole Brewster is arriving at exactly the right time. What fascinates me about this design is how one template can help create such a striking spider web effect across the quilt. Then comes the really fun part: choosing your own Halloween or novelty fabric for the centers. Depending on what you choose, your web could trap witches, ghosts, skeletons, black cats, or whatever delightfully spooky characters catch your eye. 

skill level Experienced beginner

time A multi session quilt with plenty of opportunity to enjoy choosing fabrics, string piecing, arranging the blocks, and watching the web emerge

ideal for Quilters who love Halloween, novelty prints, scrap-friendly projects, string piecing, fussy cutting, and quilts with a playful sense of humor

you will practice fussy cutting, string piecing, working with a template, arranging value and print, block construction, quilt assembly, quilting, and binding

finished size 48” x 48” [122 x 122cm] 

Nicole describes herself as being drawn to the nontraditional, and this quilt certainly shows it. She loves artistic prints, unexpected color, and the challenge of taking ideas from traditional quilting and moving them into a more modern setting. She also liked the idea of hidden meanings, which is why a spider web became such a fitting way to surround her wonderfully ghastly characters.

The finished quilt is a wonderful example of how much impact can come from repeating a single shape. Individual character prints peek out from among an assortment of coordinating strips, and once the blocks come together, that larger web effect suddenly appears. 

And you certainly don’t have to recreate Nicole’s quilt exactly. That may be one of the most appealing things about this pattern. Choose a favorite spooky novelty print for the featured motifs, surround it with coordinating scraps, and you can give the quilt an entirely different personality. Creepy, cute, sophisticated, funny, or wonderfully weird, your fabric choices get to tell the story.

Get The Ghastlies Quilt pattern here
https://www.aneedlepullingthread.com/product/the-ghastlies-quilt/

Get ANPTmag Fall 2012 print version here
https://www.aneedlepullingthread.com/product/fall-2012/

So tell me, are you a Halloween fan? And if you made this quilt, what would you want caught in your spider web: witches, ghosts, skeletons, black cats, or something completely unexpected?

Join me next week to find out which inspiring ANPTmag quilting project I’ll share with you!