About Claire
Claire is a modern quilt designer and teacher, based in Stratford Upon Avon in the UK.
Claire has always had a love for sewing which was reignited when her children were born and needed a creative outlet for herself. It wasn’t long before quilts were the only thing she wanted to sew.
In 2020, during the pandemic, when Claire was stuck between never ending on-line lessons with her kids home-schooling, she designed her first quilt pattern, the Retro Metro Quilt. It was a way she could still channel her creativity when life wouldn’t allow much time behind the sewing machine. Since then, Claire has immersed herself into the quilt designing world and has had her work featured in Love Patchwork & Quilting magazine and justhands-on.tv videos.
Claire’s designs are Inspired by modern geometric designs and repeated patterns – – wherever she finds them – – including toilet tiles and the front covers of books. Claire is the designer behind Made Just Sew. Click her to see her bright, colourful designs.
Though not formally educated in art or teaching, Claire has excelled as a quilting teacher – – winning the Big Janome Skill Share in 2021. What makes her unique is her passion for quilting and a passion for sharing what she has learned.
Click here to watch Claire share her Walking Foot Quilting techniques in an episode of The Makers Studio.
Keep up to date and follow Claire’s quilt journey over on Instagram @madejustsew
Signature Technique
Quilting with a Walking Foot
Top Tips
- Pick your backing fabric first, then match your front colours to your backing. This works really well for those of us who love colourful printed fabrics for our backing.
- If you’ve struggled with quilting, use the walking foot. It makes quilting so much easier.
- Don’t be afraid to quilt straight lines across your patchwork. It gives your project enhanced depth and texture.
- Marking quilting lines with a hera marker provides a useful guide for your straight line quilting.
- Don’t worry about mistakes. We all do it! Remember, you can always unpick stitches and come at it fresh tomorrow.
- Use quilting gloves to help you guide your quilt under the walking foot. The sticky tips of the glove give you a little extra grip.
- If you want your quilting to stand out, choose good quality colour thread to contrast the top. Colour thread can look dominating when on the spool, less so when on your quilt.
Videos
Posts
Superior Threads
Makers of King Tut thread (as well as other brands) Dr.Bob has the title of Chief Threadologist for the company and is a wealth of information. They have various short videos running on their site and well worth a visit and a listen with your cup of coffee: www.superiorthreads.com/videos You'll find lots under 'Education' and videos The one I just watched was about doing the 'snap test' on older threads which is useful to know.
Petals with Jennie Rayment
Take a look at the variation of Petal Play that Jennie created with the new black and white range of fabrics from Makower: if you can't find these fabrics in your local store try www.creativequiting.co.uk
I LOVE my new pins!
Valerie: I am in love with my new pins - how sad is that! They have made all the difference to my accurate piecing of the double irish chain quilt that I've been busy making so that it can be used on our filming day in May. I have previously always used the flower head pins, and they are still great because they lie flat and I can pick them up, but these new Clover Glass Head Fine Pins are even better; they are finer and so don't disturb the fabric hardly at all at the seam junctions: give them a try (not cheap but then how a great patchworker has great tools!).