A new project and two fabric stores

My friend, MAD, asked if we could create a wall hanging for her bedroom while I was visiting her in the San Francisco Bay area.  Of course, I was very excited.  I thought and thought about what to do, and came upon the idea of book shelves.  MAD is a voracious reader, a reviewer of YA literature for VOYA (a journal about YA lit), and the best English teacher I have ever met.  Book shelves seemed like a no brainer.  Fortunately, she liked the idea. (editor's notes:  This idea was inspired by a project by Elizabeth at Don't Call Me Betsy) We found fabric she liked for the spines and a wonderful woodgrain print for the shelves.  I brought a few pieces from my stash for background and a few more books.  Then I set to work sketching, measuring, and cutting.  The photo above is the space I turned into a quilting studio for the morning.  You can see the shelving unit has two shelves with four spaces in each one.

 

I cut all the book fabrics into 2" strips that I could cut to any size I needed to match my sketches.  I put them all on the ironing board so I could pull colors as I needed.  I want to make sure I balance the values and the colors throughout the piece.  I am finding it pretty easy to adapt any space to a studio.

This is the first space laid out.  I haven't put the background in, so you can see the placemat in the background.  I will piece all of this when I get home.  Today, I am going to work on the rest of the spaces.  Then, I will pin all the books together in order for each space, and take photos so I can get them right when I do the final piecing.  I think this is going to be very cool when it is done.
We visited two shops to find the fabric.  One was in Sunnyvale and the other in Santa Cruz.  The shop in Sunnyvale is Eddie's Quilting Bee.  This is a beautiful shop with fabulous fabrics.  The first thing I spotted as we went in was a shelf of Kaffe Fasset I drooled over.  There were wonderful batiks, collections by favorite designers, fantastic Asian designs, $1.00 fat eighths, and the best book collection I have seen in a quilt shop yet.  They also had a good selection of Laurel Burch designs, and novelty prints.  I think I may have to go back to this shop before I go home on Tuesday.
The second shop we visited was Harts Fabric in Santa Cruz.  This was completely different from Eddie's.  Harts has all kinds of fabric, including a huge selection of upholstery and home decor.  There is a wall of quilting cottons in one room that is separated by color.  There are Tula Pinks and several Moda designers, but you have to look for them in the color sections.  I know some people really like this kind of layout.  It makes me crazy.   They have a nice selection of Japanese import fabric that I have not seen in person before.  They also have several Liberty of London fabrics.  These are so beautiful, and have a wonderful light hand, but they are $43 per yard.  Worth it if you have extra money to spend.  I don't.  At least I got to see and touch them. 
Have a wonderful quilty weekend, everyone.