About Lucy
Lucy Engels is a Modern Quilter and Visual Artist, Based in Edinburgh.
With a background in Fine Art and a BA (Hons) in Printmaking from Grays School of Art, Lucy has always been creative. But the real world beckoned, so she side-stepped into the world of social work for a good decade of her life. When Lucy moved back to Edinburgh for her partner’s work, this was her opportunity to step back into her artist shoes. She hasn’t looked back!
Lucy feels that her artistic background helps her bring different kinds of knowledge, skill and inspiration to the quilts and patterns that she creates.
You may have seen some of Lucy’s work exhibited at QuiltCon in 2018, 2020, and 2021 – – where she won an award in the appliqué category for my Naive Melody Quilt. She is heavily influenced by music!
Lucy collaborates regularly with industry leaders such as justhands-on.tv, JanomeUK, Aurifil Thread, FIGO Fabrics, Oakshott Fabrics, Purl Soho, and RJR Fabrics. She also teaches online workshops to individuals, groups, and Guilds, as well as in-person workshops in my Edinburgh studio.
According to Lucy, “I create unique, modern quilt patterns that coax out your inner artist by allowing you to put your own personality and stamp on what you’re making. This isn’t quilting by numbers. You don’t have to follow what I do to the letter. Consider it more as a map to guide you towards creating a stunning piece of art that you can curl up under when it’s done.”
To see Lucy’s designs and limited edition fabric collections, visit her website: https://lucyengels.com/
You can watch Lucy make a colourful modern quilt design using a foundation paper piecing technique that she calls, “controlled improv” in this episode of The Makers Studio series.
Signature Technique
Controlled Improv
Top Tips
- Experiment with colour to create movement in your quilt.
- Map out your design on a wall before cutting and sewing.
- Use music as an inspiration for your quilt design.
- Blue tip needles work a treat for paper piecing. Fine and sharp.
- A single line of different colour thread in your quilting creates lift.
- Fold the freezer paper along template lines to help with your foundation paper piecing.
Videos
Patterns
Posts
Filming day with Karen Nicol
We spent a wonderful morning in the company of this very talented lady; she lives in Surrey and is a textile artists who has worked for some of the world's top fashion designers and now uses her talents to create stunning unique pieces from the objects she finds around her - and in charity shops! Here we are busy chatting over one of her 'lace skirts' which were in an earlier exhibition She is however currently working on her Monkey Tricks exhibition entitled 'Singerie' - 5th Nov -30th November 2013 and at the Rebecca Hossack Art Gallery, 28 Charlotte Street, Fitzrovia, London W1T 2NA
To see more of Karen's work you can visit her website: (and she also the author of a lovely book entitled 'Embellished - new vintage')
www.karennicol.com She is part of a very talented textile household as her husband (Peter Clark) works in paper collage: - you can see his work when you visit
www.peterclarkcollage.com
What to do about the layers in hand applique
Question: I am trying to do an applique flower it has abour 4 layers, including the back ground fabric, would it be better to applique 2 layers first, then do 2 on there own, and then attach it to the first 2 layers? as when i do the 4 altogether l am finding it hard to get the needle to go through all 4 layers.i am hand stitching the design.thank-you this is my first attempt at this so am very green on the best way to do this. Thank-you for any advice Sandra Answer from Valerie: The easiest way to do this layered flower is to put the first piece down - i.e.
What to do with the fusible applique pieces.
Question: Hi have just recieved Mandy Shaws Follow your own star quilt pattern and have already become stuck with the applique angels . They all have different coloured drsses on, so do l first cut out the whole angel then cut out the different parts of their colthes and then fuse them on to the background angel so it appears they are dressed ?