The Fabric Collage Finish Line: Sea Turtle Edition

The sea turtles in this week’s Finish Line Post are almost all based on my pattern, which is available online. It’s proven to be a very popular pattern both inside and outside of class—even though I’ve never published any sort of instructions specific to collaging that sea turtle—until now.

This same pattern is the one we’ll be working from in my new eWorkshop, Susan Carlson Fabric Collage: Sea Turtle, available in two weeks on March 21. (It will be announced in that Saturday’s blog post when it goes “live.”) Tom and I are wrapping up filming the video portions of the eWorkshop this week, so I thought it would be a good time to show off all these wonderful sea turtles. These quilts were begun by either students or readers of my blog, book, or Online Fabric Collage Master Class Manual.

For a preview of the Sea Turtle eWorkshop, I have created a page with information here: Susan Carlson Fabric Collage: Sea Turtle eWorkshop.

Thanks to all who shared their wonderful ocean going reptiles for this Finish Line. Starting this week’s selection is three submissions from students at my 2017 class at the Grand Hotel Needle Arts Festival on Mackinac Island (above is a photo from that class).

If you have a sea turtle—or another fabric collage creature—you’d like to share, it’s not too late, we’re always collecting them for future Finish Line posts. Use the link below to fill out a submission form and to check photo requirements.

Submit Quilt for "Finish Line"

As always, you may click on any of the following images to see them larger.

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Carol Thomas

Lake Charles, LA

This lovely turtle is by Carol Thomas, begun in the historic Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. In this past Thursday’s Throwback Thursday post write-up I linked to a page that describes that location, and how to pronounce “Mackinac” (it’s MAK-in-aw). The fabrics Carol chose to use for her turtle remind me of the rugged grace of the island—rocks, trees, and water. The word “Mackinac” is descended from the Native American word for “turtle,” as the island looks turtle-like off the coast of Lake Huron in Michigan. I love the way Carol’s turtle looks island-like itself, surrounded by green waves. And then there’s its cute little toenails.

From Carol:

I saw Susan’s exhibition at IQF, Houston. Thought to myself, I want to learn that technique!! I took Susan’s class at the Grand Hotel Needle Arts Festival.

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Kerry Steck

Woodruff, SC

Kerry took the same class as Carol Thomas (above) on Mackinac Island and Ruth Pollow (following) in 2017 where I taught a turtle class. It’s so nice to see the quilts again! Kerry looks very happy in the picture below—the Grand Hotel does surround you with a sense of luxury and relaxation and was very conducive to a couple very creative classes. Kerry did a beautiful job working within all those green fabrics and value range, creating very effective form and dimension on the shell.

From Kerry:

Started in turtle workshop with Susan on Mackinac Island in 2017, also took the fish collage class earlier that week. The turtle brings back memories of Hawaiian vacations. It was an excellent pattern to learn Susan’s collage techniques. It was really fun to see how different all the turtles in class turned out—each had their makers distinct & beautiful personalities!

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Ruth Pollow

Greenville, South Carolina

Speaking of personalities, Ruth’s turtle is a bold specimen in her fabric choices for both turtle and background. Like an underwater sunset. The yellow works for highlights, the strong blues for shadows, and the greens surround the center shell with a great transition from lights to darks. Take special note of the meandering of even more colors within the lines separating the shell plates. What a nice job.

From Ruth:

Quilt was started at Susan’s Mackinac Island Retreat in 2017 and completed shortly thereafter. The background behind the turtle took several attempts before I found the fabric that felt like water to me. It initially looked like the turtle was floating in space until I decided to add the seaweed using organza, tulle, and satin fabrics.

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Carol Golden

Chico, California

Carol did a great job putting together pattern, book, blog posts, and guild challenge to create a very personable and bubbly looking creature. This is a good example of choosing fabrics that have some sort of theme, like circles and bubbles, to tie together multiple colors. I’m impressed with the variety of fabrics Carol used and they all hold together with her groupings of those colors and values.

From Carol:

I bought your pattern online and made it for an animal challenge at my quilt guild, Annies Star Quilt Guild in Chico, CA. I watched your online blog posts and read your Serendipity Book to learn how to do the collage method. It was quite a challenge at first but I finally got involved and enjoyed the process.

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Pat Armstrong

Prescott, AZ

I met Pat in class at MISA’s (Madeline Island School of the Arts) winter location in Tucson, Arizona, January 2019. The collage she began there, “Wilma Woodpecker,” was included in a Finish Line post last August. What a treat to see more quilts created by Pat—what a fun turtle trio! I guess Pat has learned that one is sometimes not enough. Each turtle is so unique with it’s fabric selection and lots of little added bits for interest. The last one above stands out to me as Pat broke away from the turtle pattern for the center of the shell, going rogue with a mass of large patterned fabrics. Good going Pat!

From Pat:

Susan’s pattern was bought when I attended her class in Tucson. She did a demo in class of how to make it. I made the first turtle for the wall in my newly remodeled bathroom. When my sister and sister-in-law saw it they argued about who was going to buy it. They weren’t happy when I said it wasn’t for sale. I surprised them by making them each one, some months later. They live in NC where turtles are so part of the culture.

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Frances Smith

Walhalla, Michigan

Frances was one of my most intent and studious students in one of the (short-lived) on-line classes from a couple years ago.  What luscious color and pattern—giving contour and texture—she’s worked into that turtle, with a few touches of bling. Perfect. That class was set up with a duration of a couple weeks and scheduled on-line check-in’s. Obviously, Frances made good use of that time, but Tom and I realized that the life-time access to the information available in the Master Class Manual and soon the Sea Turtle eWorkshop (Frances also refers to both of those) was going to work much better for a majority of people, and those tight schedules we all have to juggle at times.

How nice to read Frances’ comments and almost hear her excitement as she experiments with fabric collage. Frances, if you want to learn more about creating form on your turtle’s shell, you’re going to like the new eWorkshop—working with value to create dimension is a skill people ask about all the time, and we worked hard to address it in this turtle class. BTW, your free-motion quilting looks great—you’re going to enjoy retirement!

From Frances:

This turtle was my second attempt at fabric collage quilting. I purchased the Fabric Collage Master Class Manual as soon as it came out and was in the first on-line class. I did the spiral exercise first, then this turtle in that class. I love this method of fabric collage and have gone on to do a couple of other small quilts using this method. I, of course see all my mistakes and want to do another one when the new class comes out.

I study both of Susan’s books, the blog posts and the Master class all the time and love seeing everyone’s work! I am going to fully retire soon so I will have much more time to work on my quilting!

 

This turtle was a joy to work on and complete! It was lovely to get feedback from Susan online. I still see areas where I can improve to make better use of fabric values to give my next turtle a more rounded feel and not feel so flat. My other challenge is to work on free motion quilting! This is not something I had not done much of so I am working to improve that!

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Skye McDonald

Phoenix, AZ

You don’t need to know the title of Skye’s turtle quilt to understand that this turtle is floating in the night sky. What a successful use of the “empty space” of the background and the placement of the turtle on it. It seems like this quilt must have a story to tell—that turtle is striving to go somewhere. It reminds me of the turtle in the books by Terry Pratchet’s Discworld series, where the planet is carried through the cosmos on the back of a giant sea turtle. A cosmic finish to the turtle, Skye, and quite a re-do on the flippers.

From Skye:

I started this in a class with Susan at Empty Spools Seminars in 2013. I always knew how I wanted to finish it, but it took me a long time to find the starry sky fabric, and then took me a long time to find a quilter, and to decide to sew on the star sequins, and then to finish it.

 

This turtle is not floating in the water, but instead is flying through the heavens! My husband says this is his favorite quilt out of all that I have made, so it is hanging in his office where he can see it from his desk.

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Cyndi Townsend

Cortland, OH

What lovely earth tones in Cyndi’s little fellow. Cyndi took my fabric collage technique and applied it to a different sea turtle pattern, adding it to a machine pieced watery background, then adding couched down yarns. A nice combination of fiber art—no wonder this turtle looks like he’s happily skipping across the sand—another quilt that looks to be telling a story.

From Cyndi:

Wanted to make a wall hanging using fabric and yarns. Came across your technique and loved it. LOVE turtles so this was a great pattern to start on. Just ordered your book to learn more.

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Holly Palmieri

Highlands Ranch, Colorado

Holly got creative by adding habitat and other creatures to her turtle quilt. This quilt has an lush and colorful Indonesian island sort of feel to it—I’d certainly like to visit the place where this turtle swims! I think aholly may have used the same pattern as Cyndi’s above. I don’t know whose pattern it is, so if anyone does, contact me and I’ll add the source of the pattern.

From Holly:

I learned collage quilting by using Susan’s book Serendipity Quilts and following her blogs as well as what other resources I could find! I love working with batik fabrics and the more colorful the better! I had seen several people who had posted Turtles and just loved them and couldn’t wait to create my own. I enjoyed adding the seagrass and fish to the ocean landscape.

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Cassandra Nunerley

Adelaide, Australia

It’s easy to see that Cassandra’s turtle isn’t based on my pattern, but it seems like a good one to end this post on—this guy is off to parts unknown. Cassandra’s collage inspiration comes out in the variety of fabrics she’s put together for the colorful coral reef and that shimmering treatment of the sun dappled water. Cheers.

From Cassandra:

I started experimenting then saw a YouTube clip of Susan talking about her method.

 

We have beautiful turtles in the Australian oceans. I saw a picture of this one which is from the Great Barrier Reef. I absolutely love fabric and designing my own quilts, so Susan’s gluing method suits me.