Quilting Makes the Quilt

This book shows a grouping of 12 different quilts. Each quilt has been made identically, 5 times. And each of the 5 is quilted with different quilt patterns, so you can compare and see how different the same quilt looks when quilted differently. It took an immense amount of time to even make the book, seeing as 60 quilts had to be made then quilted. Interestingly, there isn't a lot of words in this book. You don't need words; all you need to do is look at the quilts, compare them, and they speak for themselves. I am a quilter who loves the process of quilting as much as I like the process of making the quilt. This book completely opened my eyes to the creative side of quilting the quilt instead of sending it to a longarmer. As a bonus, there are directions on how to make all of the 12 quilts.

I purchased this book as a companion book to "The Fabric Makes the Quilt" by Roberta Horton. Here are two quilters and one believes fabric makes the quilt, and the other believes the quilting design makes the quilt. I think they are both right! Having both these books for comparison--gave me quite a visual lesson in quilting! What is truly unique about Lee Cleland's book is that she photographs a quilt and shows you how it looks with different quilting patterns. She does this with twelve quilts and it makes you truly consider how you will quilt your design. Truly the quilting is itself a design element and after studying this book--you will never make the beginner's mistake of considering the quilting pattern an afterthought. The color photos in this book are clear and well thought out. There is a pull out quilting paper in the back of the book to practice some of Lee's patterns.

This book is the only one I've found that does a really good job of showing how the quilting can change the appearance of a quilt, by showing the exact same piecing with different quilt patterns. The photography is excellent and the subject fascinating. I don't mind at all that machine quilting was emphasized...

The reviewer below seems to be biased in favor of hand quilting. Well, I'm biased in favor of machine quilting, and Lee Cleland is an amazine machine quilter, whose original designs give me many ideas. Most importantly, she demonstrates the effect different types of quilting have on the look of the finished product, which was the entire aim of her book. An EXCELLENT, WONDERFUL book!

I absolutely love this quilting book. I find it hard sometimes to think of different ways to quilt designs on my quilt. I want something unique and this book offers that. I found the pictures wonderful and unlike the first person to review this book (who must have been having an awful day- LOL), I found the quilting to be of good quality and the stitches can been seen very nicely. You do have to have an open mind to find this book useful- if you only want the same old standard quilting patterns and ideas, then this book is too interesting for you. Enjoy!

I have hundreds of books on quilting, but Quilting Makes the Quilt is the one I could not do without. I never start quilting a new quilt top without looking through it to see the impact different styles and shapes of quilting have on different quilt tops. The photographs of five different versions of each of twelve quilts offer a tremendous variety of quilting styles and designs, so the serious quilter can see directly what rounded shapes quilted on straight-edged geometric quilt tops look like, what one huge quilting design across a quilt without the quilting following the quilt design looks like, and even what various similar patterns of differing density look like as well. It is a fascinating book to study and gives the reader a golden opportunity to see exactly what difference the quilting design makes in the final appearance of a quilt--before quilting a quilt of their own. While the quilts photographed have all been machine quilted, so that the book serves as a great inspiration to anyone trying to master that art, the demonstration of the difference the quilting makes in a quilt's final appearance would be equally useful to hand quilters trying to choose a quilting design. This is a truly wonderful book.