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
Inspired by Justhands-on.tv
Pat made this lovely knitting bag as a result of purchsing the pattern from us - great job Pat.
World Quilts
Jennie: Am still in Manchester, New Hampshire, USA at World Quilt show. Nice show with good range of classes, vendors and quilts to die for. As I was on the judging team, I had a chance for a real good look at the quilts. Lots of fabric painting and raw edged applique often covered in a fine net. Hand work is almost nonexistent although there were one or two whole cloth quilts beautifully done.
What a week
Jennie: I would never have thought that a week could go by and me not prattle on the blog! Tempus certainly fugits when you don't look. Had fab day yesterday as filmed Mandy Shaw doing some amazing Christmas stuff from dolls to other delights and then went to see Kim Thittichai who did hot stuff with Hot Spots - Wow - am I going to have twinkles and sparkly bits and not necessarily on my lizards either - you will have to hang on for that salient titbit (or is it tidbit?) until the film comes out!