My Newest Quilting Booklet, Curvy Improv

When I started sewing some wonky houses last year, I didn’t imagine that I would end up falling so in love with improv quilting, nor did I know I’d write not one, but three little books on the topic! I’m happy to introduce to you my latest book, Curvy Improv! It’s available now in my Etsy shop.

This volume joins my previous two quilty how-to guides, Improv Houses and Make it Wonky. These guides are zine-style booklets detailing how to make several improv style quilt blocks, plus a ton of ways to use them in your creative quilting projects.

Quilting with curves is one of those things that seems very scary before you try it! And honestly, the precision required when quilting with traditional curved quilt blocks is tricky. But improv style curved piecing takes the pressure off completely! I was scared to try it at first, but once I started, I couldn’t believe how much fun I was having, AND how many different motifs I could make with my new curvy skills.

I mad an entire quilt using some of the methods in the book. This is my fish and forest quilt and is 100% pattern free improv! You can watch the playlist of how I made this quilt on my YouTube channel here.

Improv quilting has opened up a whole new world of quilting for me. I have a hard time with repetitive tasks, so using pattern that require of a ton of precutting and then sewing the same blocks together over and over again is very demotivating to me. I finally found my style of quilting when I got extremely experimental and started putting quilts together from my imagination, one row, or block, or elembent at a time.

I hope these books help you discover the joy that letting go and quilting freestyle can bring! Each book, including Curvy Improv has a bunch of simple elements you can use to make your quilts, whether you incorporate them into a traditional design, or do your own thing and see what comes of the different pieces you’ve made. Putting it all together is the funnest part!

Like the others in the series, Curvy Improv is also available as a digital download, which you can purchase here. If you live outside the U.S. or just prefer to have things digitally, that’s a great option for you. It’s formatted to simply be printed and stapled together in the corner, rather than formatted to be folded and assembled into book form, so that makes it extra easy on you.

I can’t wait to see what you come up with after trying out some curvy improv!

Cheers and Happy Quilting :)

Nikki