Aurora Borealis Custom Quilt

This was a fun challenge! I received a custom request for a king-sized Northern Lights inspired quilt that would capture the awe and drama of this natural arctic phenomenon. I’ve got drama to spare, but could I express it in quilt form?

These were some of the inspiration photos I was sent during planning. I have been to Iceland and Greenland before, for a quite a long vacation actually, but it was just a tad too early in the year to have witnessed the aurora borealis firsthand. She sent these photos, and having seen my galleries, thought maybe the Brightly quilt pattern (by Cluck Cluck Sew) would be a good fit. So I mocked up some samples of the Brightly, and two other patterns, Homespun and a color wash.

I would have loved making any of these three quilts; they’re stunning. And I think you’ll be able to tell which one we went with, although we made some changes to the fabric choices and color ratios.

The next step was fabric choice. The final approved stack has a variety of gorgeous solids, all from the Art Gallery Pure Solids collection, and some fabulously quirky prints that I think really increase the awe and majesty factor of the final product.

Watch as it gets built.

Then because this quilt is a behemoth (a majestic behemoth), I sent it off to be quilted on by a longarm quilter. It finished at just over the usual size for a king size quilt because all that drama cannot be contained by the usual dimensions. Christina at Piece of Home Quilts did a beautiful job quilting a linear geometric design in a deep teal blue.

And the final product! Voila!

And just for laughs and frame of reference for the size of this baby, a behind-the-scenes shot of the double stepladder setup that we used to take a full photo.