Carpenter's Wheel Quilts

I have made a few Carpenter's Wheel quilts over the years. In fact, one of them was in my suitcase that was stolen on a road trip in 2005! Never did get it back. If you see this, let me know . . .

Carpenter's Wheel, made in 2003. 20" x 20"

I foundation paper pieced the quilt above. It was a bit difficult in the way I drafted it, but it worked. NO y-seams!

When it was stolen, a good friend of mine decided to make a replacement quilt so I could take it on the road teaching and lecturing (it was on loan). Joan was gracious to let me do that. Here is her quilt. She enlarged it with those extra mitered borders.

Joan's Carpenter's Wheel

She even allowed me to take it Spain when I visited my daughter in 2006. I arranged to have a trunk show with a local quilt shop (owned by an American married to a Spaniard). Here I am letting some ladies look at it up close.

I saw a quilt online that mimicked  the Carpenter's wheel without the center star. I can draft anything, so I decided to make a 3rd quilt with a lovely piece of fabric in place of that center star. First the parts - notice that I used two triangles to mimic a diamond. Therefore, there are no y-seams!

When 2 triangles are joined this way, they are NOT a diamond but a parallelogram. But, we see diamonds!

Then I joined the 3 vertical sections. Time to add the four corner triangles.

Center of my simplified Carpenter's Wheel

Added lavender corner triangles and some borders. The only thing I had was some purple and gold fabric from Africa. Why not?! And, no - I did NOT plan how those stripes miter in the four corners! Can you believe that? It just happened!

Lotus Leaves Carpenter's Wheel: 38" x 38"

What an interesting mix of Kaffe Fasset prints, Fairy Frost and Africa, don't you think? Have you ever made a Carpenter's Wheel? If so, let me hear about it: kratovil@his.com.