Quiltspiration: The Netherlands

I truly believe that inspiration can be found just about anywhere.  I've recently been to several places here in Europe that provided ample inspiration opportunities.  Today, I'm going to share a bit about our recent trip to Holland to see the Keukenhof  flower garden show and also share a bit of tulip inspired quiltspiration.

We went the first week that the show was open so not all of the millions of tulips, daffodils and hyacinths were blooming yet, but it was still an incredible site.  It was pretty cold for spring when we visited, but as we drove in we could see that the big tulip fields where already full of color. 

I wanted to design a simple and modern quilt that reflected the look of the tulip fields in full bloom when you see them from above. I wish I had a photo to share of the fields but you can Google them and the images are really incredible. 

This is honestly a straight forward little quilt. To make it you can use a jelly roll of various flower colored solids or blenders (or 2.5inch strips) and a honey bun (1.5inch strips) of a dark brown-green color for in between the rows. Using the whole length of the strip, join the same colors together following the picture. On strips where the color breaks at some point on the strip Just join the ends and place the strip where you want the color to break for the row. There is really no reason to worry about being exact. Then just add your brown-green strip between the flower colors. I think that this would come together really quickly. I'd finish it off with a fun print for the binding to give it a bit of zing, but to each his own :)

We had a great time, and saw some really beautiful flowers. Here are a few more images of our trip just for fun, and maybe they will inspire you in some way too.

Can you tell it was cold. My daughter is wearing my husbands hat and coat.

I'd never seen tulips with fuzzy edges before this.

They also had a special exhibit of orchids too. So beautiful.