Peak of Perfection - Sewtopia Atlanta Fabric Challenge

When I heard Sewtopia would be coming to Atlanta, just a couple of hours down the road, and the teachers would be Elizabeth Hartman and Denyse Schmidt, I knew I would love to attend.  But when registration opened, I hesitated a bit on signing up and found myself on the the waiting list. Fortunately, I was able to land a spot through a cancellation, one of only 80 attendees.

In completing the registration form, I was asked if I wanted to participate in the fabric challenge.  I did not hesitate marking that box with a YES!

I am happy to show you my Michael Miller Fabric Challenge for Sewtopia Atlanta, Peak of Perfection.  I am guessing that Sewtopia was named after Utopia and according to Webster, it a place of perfection. The pattern I used is called Pike's Peak by Cheryl Brickey of Meadow Mist Designs. So I combined the two and decided on the name, Peak of Perfection.  And I know my piecing and quilting are anything but perfect.

Peak of Perfection by Paige Alexander
(Pattern: Pike's Peak by Cheryl Brickey of Meadow Midst Designs)

The Michael Miller challenge fabric arrived in late February and here is a picture I posted on Instagram.

I received 6 fat quarters and the main print was Color Play in blue by Laura Gunn.  Here it is photographed with 3 Cotton Couture solids, Opal, Lemon and Turquoise.

Michael Miller Color Play with Cotton Couture in Opal, Lemon and Turquoise

Also included were 2 fat quarters of Michael Miller's basics, Painter's Canvas, again by Laura Gunn in Coral and Blue.

Michael Miller's Painter's Canvas n Coral and Blue

According to the challenge guidelines, we could make anything for the challenge and use as least one of the challenge fabrics.  We could add in any other Michael Miller fabrics from solids to prints. The two Painter's Canvas prints spoke to me and I decided to pair them with Cotton Couture in Bright White.

Pike's Peak made its debut in Issue #2 of Make Modern, an Australian digital magazine, and included 2 colors, a lime green and hot pink, both paired with black along with a background of white.  The pattern includes 2 sizes, 50" x 50", Cheryl's version pictured here, and a smaller wall version measuring 25" x 25" which is what I made.

Pike's Peak by Cheryl Brickey of Meadow Mist Designs
(photograph used with permission)

The piecing went fairly quick but when it came to the quilting, I ended up ripping out several seams. One time I started ripping out a line of quilting where I was not satisfied with the spacing and started ripping out the wrong quilting line.  So I then removed two entire lines because it was right in the center and did not want the repaired stitching line to show.  I quilted mine similar to how Cheryl quilted Pike's Peak.  In this blog post you can see the detail of her beautiful quilting and her quilt hanging at QuiltCon 2015.

Here you can see more of the piecing and quilting detail along with the two color binding.  I chose to change the binding color in each quadrant. With just 2 fat quarters, I managed to make 32 half square triangles and piece the binding which included several extra seams due to the color changes.

Peak of Perfection by Paige Alexander, detail

A close up of the binding color change is below.

Peak of Perfection binding detail

I am glad to have my challenge piece done with time to spare and excited to be going to Sewtopia! You can see the fabrics I picked out for the Free-Wheeling Single Girl class with Denyse Schmidt in this blog post.  I am working on gathering the fabrics for Elizabeth Hartman's class now.

Quilt Stats:

• Finished size:  25" x 25" 
• Pattern:  Pike's Peak by Cheryl Brickey of Meadow Mist Designs
• Binding: 1/4" straight binding from 2" strips sewn down by hand    
• Fabrics: Painter's Canvas in Blue and Coral by Laura Gunn for Michael Miller Fabrics and Cotton Couture in Bright White
• Batting: 100% Cotton Warm & White by the Warm Company
• Thread: Aurifil 2024 White for piecing and quilting

Linking up to Finish Up Friday, Whoop Whoop Friday, Anja at Anja Quilts hosting Thank Goodness Its Finished Friday this week, Fabric Frenzy Friday, Whoop, There It Is! and Show Off Saturday.