Jane Stickle Color Selection

The most important decision in selecting fabric is the value, the amount of light or dark in a color. Choose a variety of values, including a range of lights, mediums and darks.

Brenda Manges Papadakis, Dear Jane: The Two Hundred Twenty-Five Patterns from the 1863 Jane A. Stickle Quilt, 1996. Page 13.

The Background

Brenda recommends 8 yards of background fabric in the Guidelines section of her book. In the Dear Jane Quilting group on Facebook, I’ve seen people purchasing a whole bolt (15 yards) of background fabric.^​1​ I’m inclined to go with the latter, just in case. I plan on using Kona Charcoal, a deep gray, which will allow the rainbow of fabrics to show well.

The Binding

I have really enjoyed seeing contrasting bindings on the Janes with a light background, so I want to continue in that theme. I have chosen BRIGHT by Ann Kelle from Remix. It lives up to its name! I have ordered two yards based upon my total estimation. Because I plan on doing scalloped borders, it will have to be bias cut, so hopefully I have enough.

The Backing

I honestly have no idea what I want here. I imagine I’ll do a solid Kona cotton, maybe even the Charcoal.

The Blocks

This is really where things get exciting. I have my base solids chosen, which I will use to anchor the quilt. The layout will be similar to that of @ilovemygus (photos by @twincreekquilts) below – the rainbow around the world. I plan on using many different fabrics. I’ve recently completed the Gravity Quilt by Jaybird Quilts, and have most of those fabrics left over, but I’m excited to go out and find some small scale prints to extend the rainbow further. I’m close to what I want for my base colors, but I struggle with the purple end of the scale.

I’ve selected Kona Tomato, Kona Orange, Kona Corn Yellow, Kona Clover, Kona Pacific, Kona Bright Peri, and Kona Regal. I took a lot of inspiration from the Kona Bright Rainbow Palette, but made changes in the yellow and purples. There is a good chance that I replace the Kona Regal for a pink, as it doesn’t have much contrast between it and the Kona Charcoal (at the top), but that is a decision for another day.

Layout

Lastly, I have to determine what layout of the fabrics I’d like to do.

The first is going in rainbow order from the largest diamond to the smallest, and continuing on from the outside, where the second is rainbow order starting from the inside and moving outwards with a repeat. Orange is one of my favorite colors, so having that be the corners (layout 1) is pretty alluring. The second is nice, and I believe I’ve seen a few quilts do something like this, but it feels like the focus is on the purples and pinks, which isn’t my favorite. There’s also the possibility of doing a scattered “true” sampler layout, with each color acting like a sprinkle. That seems a little busy to me, though. For now, I plan on going with layout 1.