Modern Hexies Rainbow

Last week I finished my Modern Hexies Rainbow.

This table runner / wall hanging is made using a technique made popular by Nicole Daksiewicz of Modern Handcraft. You can find her tutorial here.

I decided to made a rainbow wall hanging because I loved the thought of the bright hexies against the grey Heath fabric from Alexander Henry.  I had some Heath left over from my Wheel of Fortune mini quilt.

I recycled the 1" hexie papers I used to make Honeycomb Spin. They are called 1" hexies because each side is 1" long (that's how paper pieces are measured).

And for my final thrifty step, I dug through my scraps and cut a hexie from each of the RPYGBIV fabrics I came across. So this quilt is made entirely from things I already had at home.

Getting the hexies evenly spaced is the trickiest part of this design.  I had already made a mini quilt just to try out this technique (see below), and I knew the hexies had to be straight so the quilting lines could run through them nicely. I like to use my long ruler to keep the rows evenly spaced.

The hexies are all glued down with Roxanne's glue, and then machine quilted, so they are quite secure.

I decided to quilt with a variegated Auriful thread I had on hand.  I thought that white thread would highlight any crooked lines in the quilting, and dark colours might just disappear into the grey.  So I decided to compromise and use a variegated thread.
 

I marked lines with my hera marker, but they were difficult to see on the grey Heath fabric, so I resorted to using a chalk pencil too.

When it came to the binding I was really stuck.  Did I want black and white to let the hexies shine? Or did I want a bright colour? And if so, which colour? Mulitcolour just looked crazy.

So I went to my local quilt shop, Nancy's Stitch Studio, and the owner Mary Self suggested black and white with pops of colour.  I loved that idea, but was worried that a pop of colour might end up on the corner bend and be very bulky.  Mary said that sometimes she just makes up the binding as she is sewing it onto the quilt! What a rebel!! Why hadn't I thought of that?  Anyway, that's what I did.  I started with a little bit of quilt maths, but then made it up as I went along.  Thank you Mary!

Unfortunatley the grey background is very hard to photograph.  It looks dark in some photos and light in others.  Trust me - it's really nice in real life.

Finished size 40" x 20"