I just wanted to pop in today to share the fabric I received in May as part of the Stash Fabrics Kona Club.
May 2022 Kona Club
It might not seem very exciting, but these fabrics often do a lot of heavy lifting in a quilt. Black, gray, and white are very commonly used as background colors, and the nuance in undertone in the shades of white and gray can make a huge difference in whether a particular fabric is the right choice when considering the rest of your color palette. The photograph of the fabrics above, with the calendar print out, might be able to give you some of the sense of undertones. From what I can easily make out in the photograph of the calendar, smoke, ash, shitake, and zinc all read as having brown undertones. Titanium, shark, and chalkboard read as having blue undertones.
May 2022 Kona Club
Looking at all the fabric stacked together, you can really see the difference. In 2016, when I was wanting to make a quilt using a range of grays moving from black to white, I struggled with figuring out the undertones using the small color swatch card. So, I placed an order for a half yard of each solid and it was much easier to group them together and understand their color relationship having more fabric on hand. You can read more about my older Kona Stashing and undertone evaluation if you are interested!
Our May skies have looked similar to those moody colors, with all the rain and overcast skies we’ve had. Those colors are really pretty all stacked together, and I can see how helpful it is to see them stacked rather than those little swatches.
It wasn’t till I started using gray in some of my rainbow scrap quilts that I realized there were two classes of grays, the blue toned and what I called the taupe toned. The blue toned seem to work better with the jewel tones I usually use in my scrap quilts. What would you pair with the “brown” toned grays?
Very interesting about the undertones. I love this month’s stack! Good luck finding a place to stash it! 😉
That is one gorgeous stack of fabric! I am always fascinated about the undertones, and am drawn to things with a blue undertone. But, I know there are times you need the yellow undertone, but it is not the part of the color wheel to which I normal lean. I have been looking at a lot of those colors as I virtually paint our living room. It is a dark beadboard, and while it is not happening soon, I am leaning towards a grey or blue or greenish neutral.
These are such great neutrals and you are so right, having larger pieces is so important to really see the undertones to the fabric.
Not all of them, but putting a great deal of those colors together in a design makes me think; “Stone Garden”