Tag Archives: aesthetic

Color Inspiration Thursday {16}

August 29, 2014 kittywilkin 1 Comment

Welcome to Color Inspiration Thursday. It’s a two-posts-in-one-day kind of day here, so I will keep this one aesthetic. Color palettes are made using Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and my photographs. Your inspiration this week comes from two very different locales. The first photos are from more of my garden harvest. We have had tomatoes galore, which means fresh tomato on everything, salsa, salsa, more salsa, and tomato sauce!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Black, Poppy, Chocolate, Smoke, Taupe, Paprika

Add a helpful two-year old and your palette changes a bit:

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Black, Taupe, Earth, Coal, Paprika, Mahogany

The next photos are from Holbrook Island, off the coast of Maine.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Coal, Steel, Ash, Black, Windsor, Pewter

Sometimes simple, “plain” things are beautiful. I found this roof-to-wall transition quite aesthetically pleasing, and I love the combination of violets and seafoam greens that result. The seafoam green is a bit lost in the Kona matches, but I might tweak my fabric choices if using this palette in the future so that the green is more prominent.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Basil, Grass Green, Moss, Spring, Espresso, Steel

With beautiful beaches on the outskirts, deep dark pine forest on the inside, Holbrook Island Sanctuary State Park is a gorgeous place to explore. The forest floor was covered with moss and lichens, which created another little world best seen from an inch or two away while laying on your belly.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Steel, Charcoal, Ash, Buttercup, Deep Rose, Denim

These rainbow strings were washed up on the rocky beach, which adds a fun pop of color to an otherwise stony palette. I kind of love this one!

Which palette is your favorite this week?

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {15}

August 21, 2014 kittywilkin 5 Comments

As summer drags to its end, harvest time picks up speed. We’ve been picking veggies galore from our garden over the past weeks, and preserving as much and as fast as we can. Our garlic and blueberries have done especially well this year, and are slowly filling our pantry and freezer. We’ve made a batch of salsa from garden tomatoes, peppers, onions, garlic, and cilantro, and I’m hoping to make pickles soon since our pickling cucumbers are multiplying quickly. Green beans and kale have been (or will be soon, in the case of kale) blanched and frozen, and we’ve eaten garden broccoli a few times already. I love this time of year.

This week your color inspiration comes from some of my garden harvest photos made into color palettes with Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1. May you be inspired to quilt, create, and grow healthy goodness in your own backyards!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Ash, Steel, Baby Blue, Dresden Blue, Regal, Regatta

I love this palette, but I’m already a huge fan of blue. The grays paired with the range of beautiful blues makes this a palette that is sure to be seen in a project of mine someday in the future.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Mushroom, Steel, Black, Charcoal, Shadow, Slate

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Black, Evergreen, Ash, Silver, Ivy, Mushroom

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Parchment, Mocha, Espresso, Coal, Stone, Taupe

Earthy palettes galore today. Kona earthy neutrals have really been prominent in my garden photos, and I love it! I’m all about a bright rainbow quilt any day, but there is something sophisticated and soothing about an earth-tone quilt with just a tad of natural color.

Have you made an earth-toned quilt? Do they make you as happy as brightly colored quilts?

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {14}

August 15, 2014 kittywilkin 3 Comments

Color is everywhere. Sometimes, the coordination of complementary colors is what attracts your interest; sometimes the play of very different or unexpected colors stands out; and sometimes the complete saturation of one color is striking enough to draw your eye. This week’s color inspiration palettes come from color-rich scenes from a fairly common structure: a lighthouse. As always, my photographs are created into palettes using Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Pewter, Earth, Cocoa, Poppy, Sienna, Taupe

Last weekend, my family and I took a lovely day trip to Owls Head, Maine, and began our day with a visit to the Owls Head Lighthouse. When entering the lighthouse, the red stairs circling up the red brick interior struck me as very beautiful. Having my camera ever at the ready, I took a few photos, carefully keeping the sunspots out of the frame. Subtle, earthy reds.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Delft, Ash, Everglade, Dresden Blue, Black, Chestnut

Once at the top, I was greeted with another beautiful sight. The bright blue sky and blue ocean, reflected through and by the lighthouse light made a peacefully blue-heavy scene. Ideally I would have loved to wait until some tall, gorgeous sailing ship was in the background, but there’s only so much one can do when two little kids are waiting. Beautiful lighthouse blues.

Do you prefer palettes created primarily from a single color, or those featuring multiple colors?

Search facebook, instagram & twitter for #quiltspiration365 for a quilting inspiration for every day of the year (more on this soon!)

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {13}

August 7, 2014 kittywilkin 7 Comments

Sometimes you see a burst of color so amazing, you just can’t let it go. That happened to me yesterday, when my cousin Kayley posted these amazing photos of glass sculptures created by Dale Chihuly, seen at Chihuly Garden and Glass in Seattle, Washington. Kayley is visiting our aunt in Seattle, and her photos are just amazing! They are taken with her camera phone, but the back-lit glass sculptures look so vibrant that I feel like I could reach out and touch them. Most of the photos are detail shots taken of a suspended 1,400-piece, 100-foot-long sculpture.

Part of Dale Chihuly's suspended 1,400-piece, 100-foot-long sculpture in the Chihuly Garden and Glass in Seattle, Washington. — Part of Dale Chihuly’s suspended 1,400-piece, 100-foot-long sculpture in the Chihuly Garden and Glass in Seattle, Washington.

I think you will agree that these photos just begged to be turned into quilt-inspiration color palettes!

These beautiful palettes are created with Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and photographs taken by my talented cousin Kayley Gallagher.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Tangerine, Lipstick, Ocean, Royal, Cedar, Citrus

I absolutely love this color palette! Consisting almost entirely of primary colors, it is bright and cheerful. I think it would make a great kids’ quilt.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Mahogany, Poppy, Lipstick, Plum, Surf, Hibiscus

This palette makes me think of the purple hat ladies. Purple hat ladies make me think of fun-loving, bold and beautiful women who do what they want without concerning themselves with what others may think. Can you tell that I hope to join their ranks someday? What fun! Passionate reds and purples, with a bit of rich mahogany make this another vibrant palette.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Black, Sable, Cappuccino, Shadow, Parsley, Honey

This palette isn’t colorful, but sometimes we need to focus on neutrals. This earthy palette has a good balance of neutrals and achromatic colors and would make a lovely subtle quilt or foundation for a quilt with a splash of additional color (maybe a bright Leprechaun green to pull from that subtle kona Parsley?) Plus, what an amazing glass squid sculpture!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Slate, Lime, Wheat, Lipstick, Rose, Corn Yellow

I’ll leave you with one more rainbow color palette to cap off this week. This photo features all the colors of the rainbow, which is well represented in the resulting palette. I don’t know about you, but I’m on a definite rainbow gradient quilting kick lately. You can’t go wrong with rainbow!

Special thanks to Kayley this week for letting me use her photographs to help inspire more colorful creative works of art. Enjoy!

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {12}

August 1, 2014 kittywilkin 2 Comments

One of my favorite parts about traveling is the variety of new sights that you get to see. I like to look at things from an up-close-and-personal perspective, especially when it comes to nature. With my background in environmental science and ecology, I like to think that I see differences and similarities in landscape and vegetation that a normal passerby may not notice. Nature is endlessly beautiful, and when seen from an intimate distance, that beauty is intensified greatly. Here are some bits of beauty as seen in my travels over the past week.

These color palettes are created using Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and my photographs.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Charcoal, Coal, Pewter, Black, Stone, Taupe

The beach on Lake Erie is a nice balance of fine sand and smooth rocks of varying sizes. I’ve become accustomed to the rocky Maine coast, and the beaches here in Ohio are a gentle respite from those footwear-requiring, albeit beautiful, beaches. Varied rock types, including many conglomerates and fossils can be found along the beaches, which add to the aesthetic.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Palm, Laurel, Black, Chocolate, Shale, Coal

These green buds were too awesome to pass by. It’s another earthy, dark palette, but the balance of green and shady grey-blues with the dark black/brown are a beautiful embodiment of green goodness.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Evergreen, Fog, Shale, Palm, Ivy, Parsley

Buttonbush is a wetland shrub typically found in standing water. When I was a wetland scientist doing delineations, we LOVED finding buttonbush since it is an obligatory wetland plant and therefore a clear indicator of the wetland area, not to mention its gorgeous and whimsical flower. This palette is included more for the novelty of the plant than the colors, but it’s another lighter variation on the green and blue nature palette.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Spice, Gold, Amber, Garnet, Rich Red, Peridot

I wouldn’t leave you without at least one big burst of color! This tiger lily from my mom’s garden just burns with vibrancy! While tiger lilies bloom in the height of summer, I can’t help but feel a bit of autumn in this palette. I’m a summer lover, though, so I am NOT hurrying autumn along by any stretch. I just need to make that clear. I’ll take summer for as long as I can have it!

Enjoy! I’d love to see what you create with these palettes.

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {11}

July 24, 2014 kittywilkin 2 Comments

This week you will get another glimpse into the colorful world of the Maine coast. Meanwhile, I’m driving all day long with my husband and two small children, off toward Ohio for our next family vacation! You get the better end of the deal, I think, but I hope to have some new fun photographs for next week’s color inspiration.

As always, the color palettes are created using Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and my photographs.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Charcoal, Steel, Pewter, Dusty Blue, Sweet Pea, Black

I love to get a really close look at the stones and shells at the beach. What from above looks like a bunch of rocks, when inspected from an inch or two away, is an entire world of complex beauty. Tiny bits of shell, stone, sea glass, and even pieces of sea creatures create a gorgeously intricate scene.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Steel, Fog, Wasabi, Yarrow, Sunflower, Raffia

Vacationing with children, there are sure to be little splashes of color in the form of buckets, shovels, and other beach toys. I couldn’t resist a photo of this bright yellow bucket in the surf, and I love the color palette that resulted. Yellow and gray are GREAT together!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Pepper, Coal, Spice, Earth, Primrose, Shale

A lobster tail washed up onto the beach, providing the perfect finale for the Maine coast color palettes. After all, Maine and lobster are synonymous according to some people. I have really loved the heavy presence of gray in many of these coastal color palettes, and I love how well gray plays with the pops of color that emerge in other details.

I hope these color palettes inspire you, and I would love to see any quilts that you create using these palettes!

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {10}

July 17, 2014 kittywilkin 9 Comments

Greetings from the coast of Maine! This week, my family is vacationing on Hancock Point, Maine, with my husband’s family. We’ve had a solid mix of sunny and stormy weather, but the forecast looks promising for the remaining two days of our trip. Despite the rain, I’ve taken hundreds of photos since we’ve arrived (does anyone else have a penchant for filling camera card capacities in record time?!), both of my kids enjoying playtime with Grammy, Grampy, and Aunts and Uncles, and of course plenty of shells and rocky coast. Be prepared for a good month of Maine coast-fueled color inspiration!

Here are the inspiration color palettes for the week, created with Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 and my own photographs.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Baby Blue, Charcoal, Moss, Dresden Blue, Raffia, Biscuit

A Maine coast inspired day would not be complete without a photograph of the gorgeous crashing tide on the seaweed and barnacle-bedecked rocks. I have loved watching the tide ebb and flow, and our view of Acadia (that’s Cadillac Mountain in the background) makes the view that much sweeter. There is something peaceful about the gentle sway of the seaweed as the waves bring the tide in or out, even with the smashing spray on the rocks. I love this color palette exactly as it formed. To me, it’s quintessential Maine coast: peaceful and earthy.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Steel, Sable, Smoke, Black, Moss, Charcoal

Exploring the treasures that abound along the coast is especially exciting with my two- and four-year-olds. There is nothing like the endless wonder of a child encountering nature’s beauty. This starfish is being gently held by my normally rambunctious two year old son. He didn’t even throw the rock into the water after holding it–amazing!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Ash, Shale, Old Green, Stone, Black, Charcoal

Never in my life have I found more perfectly polished and abundant sea glass than on this private home’s beach on Hancock Point. I love sea glass, and simply stacked on a smooth, dark, Maine stone, this palette brings me so much joy and peace. A bit of gentle turquoise (Shale meets Old Green) and light grays, with the solid foundation of the black/charcoal stone.

Enjoy these first peeks into my week. There will be more Maine coast palettes awaiting you next Thursday!

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {9}

July 11, 2014 kittywilkin 3 Comments

Thursday… was yesterday. I had a rare date night with my husband last night, which meant the day was spent packing overnight bags and getting us and the kids up to the in-law’s house, getting ready, etc. So this week you’ll get your color inspiration on Friday, just in time for the weekend! This summer has been a great reminder as to why summer is one of my all-time favorite seasons. I just love the endless beauty that grows, blooms, and emerges daily. This week’s color palettes feature a few newly blooming flowers from my garden. I certainly hope you are not tiring of flower photos! Created with the Play Crafts Palette Builder 2.1, here are your inspiration palettes for the week.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right: Palm, O.D. Green, Pewter, Leprechaun, Hibiscus, Cappuccino

This palette is exactly as it was created by the Palette Builder, without any tweaking or moving of colors. I love it. The little burst of bright green (Leprechaun) and purple (Hibiscus) are so well balanced by the more muted greens, grey, and dark brown. I could see these colors in a throw quilt for a couch in an elegant living room.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right: Sunny, Yarrow, Gold, Cedar, Paprika, Corn Yellow

You can’t go wrong with a sunny palette like this one! Everyone needs a bit more yellow in their lives, right?

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Peridot, Basil, Eggplant, Violet, Magenta, Punch

This flower was actually photographed at a friend’s house at Pemaquid Point, Maine. I saw the flowers dangling from a trellis alongside the house and simply had to take a few photographs. Such a voluptuous, gorgeous flower! And the colors are among my favorites these days. All I need is a bright teal background and it would be perfect. Even as is, I love this palette of brightness.

Tomorrow my family and I are headed off to the coast of Maine, to a house in Hancock right on the ocean. I’m excited to spend some quality time with my family, swimming, kayaking, and taking walks along the coast in search of treasures. I hope to do some sewing if we have any rainy days, but as with any vacation, who knows what each day will hold? I do know that I will be on the lookout for splashes of unexpected color! You never know what you will find by the ocean.

Where is your favorite place to vacation?

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {8}

July 3, 2014 kittywilkin 3 Comments

In honor of the 4th of July tomorrow, your inspiration color palettes for the week feature red, white, and blue in true patriotic fashion. I have a confession to make: I did a lot of tweaking to these palettes to get them to be primarily red, white, and blue. Don’t get me wrong–the colors are all present in the photographs; they just were not the colors that came up on the palette when first created. That’s one of the features of the Play Crafts Palette Builder 2.1 that I love, though. You can move the color-choosing dots around on the photograph until you find the featured colors you love.

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Wine, Tomato, Rose, Snow, Fog, Regal

Our garden strawberries are now slowing to a trickle, but we had a decent crop this year despite an overly weedy strawberry bed. I took these pictures of our first harvest, a bit over a week ago. Nothing like some good red, white, and blue (blueberries won’t be far behind) from the garden!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Coal, Shale, Crimson, Paprika, Shadow, Pewter

I love all of the stony grey-blues that find their way into this palette. I think it would make a great patriotic quilt, or depending on how you lay out the colors, would be quite a nice earthy quilt with the red as a feature color.

What would you make with these palettes?

Have a safe and fun holiday weekend to those of you in the United States!

Design, Life

Color Inspiration Thursday {7}

June 26, 2014 kittywilkin 1 Comment

This week’s color inspiration comes from yet another flower adorning our yard: the locust tree’s gorgeous pink blooms. Many locust trees have white flowers, but the previous owners of our house had a serious thing for beautiful flowers, so it does not surprise me that ours flowers pink. These flowers not only look beautiful, but they smell great as well. Here are color palettes from two very different photographs of these beautiful blooms, created with Play Crafts’ Palette Builder 2.1 combined with my photographs. I hope they inspire you!

Corresponding Kona cottons from left to right:
Cerise, Olive, Plum, Lupine, Petunia, Raffia

The locust blooms begin with this glorious, vibrant pink, but slowly fade to a hazy purple as the petals die and blow off the tree. The tree’s show of beauty is not yet complete, however. The purple petals cover the ground beneath the tree, blowing about in the breeze and making everything prettier.