Stash Statement : Make the Most of Your Fabrics with Easy Improv Quilts. This is a great book if you are looking for ways to use up your scraps and left over materials. The author likes to blend old with new and provides different ways (panel, strip or block) to work with your material. There are lots of different projects that could all be adapted to suit your own tastes. Ideally the book is suited to intermediate and above levels and is brilliant for reusing and reducing material waste.

I am a quilter and have a stash of pieces of fabric I have saved from every project I have down. I kept saying I want to put them together so I have a memory of the different fabrics. This book is my saving grace, what great ideas to tie in all those pieces of fabric. The author provides detailed instructions and graphics to a variety of quilts that can be made using your stash. All of the projects are not typical design and can be your own masterpiece per se. This book is suitable for a beginner or advanced sewer. My favorite is the falling stars.
I received a complimentary copy of this book, opinions expressed in this review are solely my own.

I loved the different take on piecing and creative ways of cutting. The idea of using what you have on hand is great. If you’re new to scrap quilting or like a free flow quilting form this book is for you! It’s fun and has a lot of the basics for beginners as well.

I received an ARC of “Stash Statement: Make the Most of Your Fabrics with Easy Improv Quilts,” from NetGalley and Fox Chapel Publishing/Landauer Publishing in exchange for an honest review.

I have a huge fabric problem: I can’t seem to force myself to throw away old clothes, curtains, sheets, and small pieces of so-called useless fabric. So naturally, when I see a book titled, “Stash Statement: Make the Most of Your Fabrics with Easy Improv Quilts,” I immediately had to read it. Usually, I rely on old block designs and then design my own quilts. But I’m always tempted to broaden my horizons with new books like this.

I really like how the author, Kelly Young, focuses on blending newer fabrics with old fabrics because this is what I—and many women—have always done. Apparently, however, the author states that this type of quilting, which she calls Improv Quilting, “…recently exploded in modern quilting…”

Young discusses quilting tools and tips and techniques, which will be helpful for beginners. She also includes three different methods for this “Improvisation Quilting”: Panel Method, Strip Method, and Block Method, and provides full color photographs and instructions for each.

The foci of this book primarily deals with sewing like scrap colors together (e.g., blues with other shades and patterns of blue), using a solid background fabric to set off the clusters pieced fabrics, and using multi-colored pieces as the background to set off solid fabrics.

This book includes both black & white images and full-color photographs. Although this book is only eighty pages, Young incorporates several different patterns: Grand Bazaar (which appears on the cover), Louvered, Precarious, Old Glory, Beach Retreat, Fire Pit, Detour, Murrina, Take Flight, Scattered, Bloom Chicka Bloom, Lily Pad Pond, Catch a Falling Star, College Prep, and Regatta.

These patterns are especially helpful to newer quilters or those quilters who absolutely **have** to have patterns. Other quilters, like myself, will find these very excellent instructions without value, though. Seasoned quilters need only look at a picture to figure out how to assemble it. In this case, this book is still a great way to inspire those quilters.

What I really like is that, in several of the finished quilts, I can tell that Young used free motion quilting (FMQ). FMQ looks different—the lines are generally not even. I use FMQ on my home sewing machine to save money. Normally, authors will get their quilt tops quilted using mechanized patterns on a long arm quilting machine—either by doing it themselves or by paying an extraordinary amount of money to have someone else do it for them (if they ask the long arm quilter to use professional FMQ or “Show Quilting,” the price is exponentially higher). I believe they do this because this results in a “perfect” quilt, with even lines.

I really appreciate the fact that the author used FMQ because it shows the imperfections of quilting and, of course, the imperfections of being human. As one senior scholar told me while I was writing my dissertation, “There are two kinds of dissertations: perfect ones and finished ones.” By including this “imperfect” quilting, Young shows readers that quilts made at home can still be beautiful and will be, in my own opinion, even more beautiful than those using mechanized patterns.

This book is a perfect gift for any beginning quilter. And for more experienced quilters, the beautiful color images are likely to inspire increased creativity. I definitely recommend this book!

I like the overall technique this book is based on. I'm always looking for a way to use my ever-growing scrap pile. Directions are simple to follow with great images for supplementation. I do with there were more, less basic, quilt designs offered. Some of the sample quilts aren't the most visually appealing as shown; they would be with different fabric choices. Catch a falling star is my favorite pattern shown in this book.

A terrific guide for making colorful quilts out of scrap material. I am not a quilter but I loved the gorgeous photos of quilts made using these techniques. Helpful for both beginners and advanced quilters.

As a quilter with quite the box of scrap fabric, it’s always exciting to see ideas for these pieces of fabric. (It feels like making a quilt for free to use them)

I loved that this book not only was beginner friendly, but had lots of tips for even the most seasons quilters. The pictures are not only bright and beautiful, but very helpful.

I think I just wished that the quilts + ideas were a little more modern. Obviously depending on the fabric scraps you have your colors change immensely, but most of the ideas felt at odd with the kind of fabric I tend to collect.

The author provided an excellent resource for utilizing scrap pieces of cloth from your fabric collection. Her book includes pictures on nearly every page, guiding you through the process of creating various shapes and patterns. She essentially takes color groups of fabrics to achieve these designs, creating a colorful mish mosh blanket in the end. Some of her designs are very modern, which I appreciated. There is a good blend of classic quilting designs and modern ones that are sure to delight crafters of all ages.

Bright and colorful quilts are pictured. The instructions are clear, but more for an advanced quilter rather than beginner , as it is a go with your gut type way of construction. I will be looking forward to trying some of these techniques on a much smaller scale at this stage in my abilities.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.