Words are really strange things. They have fixed meanings. We can look them up in a dictionary. But then suddenly they don’t mean what we think they do! Societal norms vary. We get “Wicked” and “Sick” being positive words – I am too old to be able to handle that!!
But then we get words that do actually mean what we always thought they meant but somehow it’s acceptable! But only when used in a specific context. “Ugly” is one of those words, when used about quilting fabric. Though not when applied to a quilt – I can’t think of any time when you could get away with calling someone’s quilt ugly!
When used in the context of fabric for quilting, “Ugly” does not have the same pejorative tone that the word might have when applied to other things. It is not a word that I would ever have encouraged my children to use. But when applied to quilting fabric it has its place. It is quite simply, a fabric that you can’t imagine using! (Someone else might love it, and that is fine)
Bonnie K Hunter says that if you think a fabric is ugly you just haven’t cut it small enough.
There are a couple of courses/workshops that I teach where I actively encourage people to bring along their ugly fabrics, fabrics that bring forward a sense of “what on earth was I thinking?”, fabrics that looked stunning on the bolt but the minute you get them home you wonder if you were looking at the same fabric. It is amazing what happens to these fabrics – they can lead to some amazing “WOW” moments. The most stunning of these is Stunning Stacked Pinwheels. Look what happens when you apply this technique.
How about this fabric? Hard to see what I might use it for.
This incredible Mardi Gras fabric turned up in 3 different workshops, spread over a few years. Look how the same treatment yields different looking results.
From this fabric came the following
So if you have an ugly fabric lurking in the bottom of your stash, have a look at it and see how you can turn it into your best friend. Is there a pattern that would allow it to shine? What would it look like chopped up? Can you mix it with other fabrics to make it behave?
And remember, language is fluid. Even if you are not comfortable using a word in one way, consider the meaning that the person speaking is giving that word. Don’t jump to conclusions that they are using the word pejoratively.
Enjoy your ugly fabrics and see what adventures they can take you on!
Very interesting. Never really thought of cutting up ugly fabric into smaller pieces to make it beautiful! Thanks for the good read
So glad you enjoyed it