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
Pauline’s Patchwork’s New Shop
Val: My friend Valerie and I decided that we neededa day out and what better excuse that to visit a quilt shop. Pauline and Sarah (Pauline's Patchwork) moved from Brewers Quay in Weymouth into their new shop in Poundbury back in January. I managed to find directions from GOoglemaps but interestingly enough Poundbury is not marked on the recent traditional maps - it can be found on the western edge of Dorchester (Dorset) and is actually more of a development (and work in progress judging by all the diggers still there) than a village. A number of small artisan shops surround Pauline's and there are several really lovely places to eat.
Golf fundraising day for Momentum
A team of 4, headed up by husband Stuart, joined in the fundraising golf day at Richmond Golf course to raise money for Momentum. Here is a pic of the four (the front view isn’t pretty!) the day was a huge success and raised more than £5,000 for the charity. For more information you can go to their site www.moment-um.org
Quilting retreat at Dunford House weekend – June 2011
Our weekend get together at Dunford House in Midhurst was, if I say it myself, a great success. There was a great deal of laughter and not only during the quiz and Jennie's talk which included various layers of clothing being taken off (!)but there was also a lot of quilting and patchwork done; Jennie's class got to grips with the 3D effect and inset Y seam and Sarah's class beavoured away making jelly roll quilts like they were going out of fashion - and several were layered quilted and bound!!! and my group got to grips with UFO's.