In the upper midwest, you’ll find me snapping pictures of snowfalls to save for future landscape quilt projects. So far, the photo collection out-numbers the quilts created, but they do provide fun inspiration. My completed landscape quilts hang in my home and office, and I’d like to share a few winter-themed quilts with you today.
January In My Backyard
This morning, the view outside my window looks much like the quilt above. I created January In My Backyard many years ago. Since making this quilt, I’ve learned a lot of landscap quilting tricks from my quilting buddy Natalie Sewell, yet it’s my favorite winter scene. There isn’t any painting on the fabric, just raw edge appliqué. It’s rustic, but fun, and hangs above our fireplace during the winter season.
Blue Birches
I gave this landscape quilt to my friend, Deanna. It’s really straighter than the photo shows! There were only 3–4 fabrics used in the scene. The key was choosing the right hand-dyed fabrics. To learn more of the process I used in this quilt, read my Blue Birches blog posting.
Chance of Flurries
The background fabric and tree fabric are one and the same. I chose an ombré fabric that gradated from cream to black. The fabric has since been discontinued—sorry. It’s a moody scene, much like the skies before the snow starts falling.
Moon Lit Birches
A greeting card was the inspiration for this landscape quilt. At first I wondered how I’d create the shadows: A mottled gray fabric provided the solution. Snow scenes are some of the easiest landscape quilting projects to create since there is high contrast.
Future Landscape Quilt Project Inspirations
When you look at these photos, notice the blue cast in the top image and the brown cast in the other two photos. Winter is more than just black and white!
How You Can Create Landscape Quilts
My quilting buddy Natalie Sewell and I have written numerous books on landscape quilting and have presented the book topics on Sewing With Nancy many times. You can watch the 3-part series on Beginning Landscape Quilting.
The process is like paint-by-number! We show it in picture form in the Beginning Landscape Quilting book and DVD. Here’s a teaser of the process.
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Step one: Choose the fabrics.
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Step two: “Messy cut” the background. Draw in trees.
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Step three: Shade the trees with silver and black Sharpies.
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Step four: Add tree limbs and branches.
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Step five: Learn how to stipple, we make it simple. Then, frame your artwork in a 5″ x 7″ frame!
What landscape scene would you like to create?
I’m always interested in knowing what seasonal landscape you would like to design? It could be a virtual quilt or an actual quilt. I do a lot of virtual sewing and quilting. There isn’t always enough time to actually make everything I’d like to, so day dreaming about it is fun too!
Watch Beginning Landscape Quilting, Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 on Sewing With Nancy online.
Now that you’ve seen how easy it is to dive into landscape quilting, which season would you most like to capture in landscape quilt imagery? Leave your answer in the comment section below for a chance to win a copy of the Beginning Landscape Quilting book from Nancy’s Notions. One winner will be randomly selected.
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I am attempting Winter trees in Landscape Quilts book. I have followed your shows and books for years. You are a very talented artist. My favourite is landscape but I have done a lot of traditional quilts as well. I only got a laptop last year and I am blown away with all I can see on line. I’m a senior and it’s true what they say “you are never too old to learn. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and inspiring us to create what is in our minds.
My first pick would be fall in Michigan. Or winter. Or spring. Or summer. I love all the seasons in Michigan.
I have many of your books on sewing and fitting, read your blog religiously and tape your PBS shows whenever they are on. Your presentations are wonderful. I would love to have your book on landscaping quilting because I have several beautiful Sunrise pictures from Nov. 2015 thru Feb. 2016 taken on my farm in Central VA with the sky changing colors from pink shades to lavender to shades of purple with even a bright yellow in the center below the other colors and the darkness of the Cedar trees along the horizon at the base. It has been my intention to make a landscape quilt of one or more of these pictures, but not sure how to go about this idea. Thank you for your consideration. BTW, I haven’t been able to view your 3 videos on this; but, will try to do so now.
I would love to do a winter landscape with snow & a winter sky. There is so much you can do with this type. Love all of Nancy’s landscape & how to do them. Would like to win the book on Landscapes. I have been a fan of Nancy for many years & learned a lot from her site her tv programs & books & kits.
Dear Nancy, I was amazed by your landscaping video. i would honored to be chosen the winner and would love to learn step by step how to do landscaping quilts. Thank you Gloria
Love the winter scenery guilts. Especially the birch trees, my favorites.
I love the birches! I would like to try some aspens I photographed on a New Mexico trip.
Summer with all the beautiful flowers in bloom!
I think I would like to do a fall or winter one.. It’s so interesting. Thank you for the chance.
Winter would make a great scene to display in our cabin. Thanks so much.
I just started doing my first landscape quilt – a fall scene from a picture in our back yard – and I’m hooked! I can’t wait to try a winter scene, maybe from the same perspective. I had already bought the book and it’s fabulous – thank you for your inspiration!
My son was planning to paint a mural of white birch trees on the wall of my sewing room. I have a beautiful river birch outside my sewing room window. After looking at your landscape quilts I think I may make a quilt instead of a mural.
I love all of the fall colors but I also love the snow and winter shades of monotone colors.
I would love to do an Australian summer sunset
You winter quilts are are amazing. Cheers Faye
I love the winter season because of snow.
I love all the seasons and the different colors each have. I would have to pick a different place for each season. Thank you for the giveaway.
I love all the seasons and the different colors each have. I would have to pick a different place for each season. Thank you for the givaway.
I’m inspired to try a late fall scene: grey sky with almost bare trees and the spot of bright color clinging to the branches above the burnished ground. Next I’d try a spring scene with delicate coloring above a moist greening fields and bushes.
I love the winter scences. I would really like to learn how to do landscape quilts. Thanks for the giveaway.
I would like to make a winter landscape that I could hang on my air conditioner cover. In the summer I could hang it below the air conditioner to remind me that I was looking forward to the hotter months!
I think I would like to do winter.
I am inspired by your winter scenes! Winter it is!
Autumn is my favorite season. But with the winter we’ve had, I’m definitely thinking SPRING at the moment!
I would love to make an elegant Springtime Landscape Quilt with Cheery Blossoms, Flowing Waters, and River Rocks.
Thank you,
Kimberly
I love Spring and all the promises.
Most of my outdoor photos are taken during the winter and spring so those would be my choices for a quilt.
I love the colors of Fall.
I love your winter/snowy landscapes. They just look so real! I moved from Ohio to Texas, so I “sorta” miss those snowy scenes. So I’d probably do one with snow.
I would do spring and use French knots for the leave buds, it’s already in the works (at least on paper).
While all seasons are beautiful in their own right I love the change of colors in the foliage. I would like to do a fall wall hanging with all the beautiful colors in it.
Hi Nancy, I enjoy your show! You are such an encouragement & a true inspiration. I have wanted to do landscape quilting for a couple of years. Since I’ve been collecting fabrics & photos, I believe I’m about ready to begin. I plan to donate most of my quilts. Thank you for all you do in the quilting community!
I have always wanted to do a landscape quilt but have no idea where to start. This book and series is just what I need!
I SO enjoy watching you & Natalie working together! I’ve sketched some very old trees in a lovely neighborhood area. I’d like to scale it down & do a winter quilt – I like the contrast. P.S. I learned a lot by viewing your quilts Nancy. Thanks for sharing them.
I would love to create a wall hanging with all the seasons. There is something about each season that I find appealing. I would do all seasons all the time. I love the look of landscape quilts.
I would like to do one of Mt. Rainier, it is so beautiful. Landscape/art quilts intrigue me to try and quilt. Regular quilting doesn’t really interest me. Boo, I know, I know.
Fall in New England is my favorite time of year, so it would be fall.
I would love to capture & then quilt fall. The beautiful colors, shapes, textures you could use! A masterpiece for sure!
I love the fall colors so that is the landscape season I’d like to do. Thanks for all the inspiration you provide us.
I like fall with the beautiful colors and the season is too short before the leaves fall off the trees. Thank you.
Would so love to make landscape quilts but just can’t afford full priced books on our senior income. Love your posting. Brought me pleasure. Thank you so much. I am a 76 year old retired nurse, writer and sewer.
I would love to make a Springtime landscape wall hanging. Spring is full of renewals and so many pretty bright flowers. Thank you for all you do, been following you since 1984.
I’ve tried landscape quilts with not the best of results. After viewing this video I see some of the mistakes I was making. Wow can I use this this book.
My first instinct is that I’d choose spring as it is my favorite season. It represents new, fresh and beautiful beginnings to me. After seeing your winter quilts, however, I’d choose winter (not my favorite season). After a fresh snowfall, everything looks so pristine. Doing a winter scene would present a new, fun challenge.
I would like to do a fall scene as I love the way trees look as they are just dropping their leaves. We don’t really get winter where I live, but I do enjoy seeing quilts of these fabulous tree in snow designs.
I would li like to landscape quilt winter scenes. Living in the woods, the fresh fallen snow supplies endless variations.
I have been thinking about this topic since attending your quilt expo last summer. I have decided to try bird and animal portraiture in a realistic landscape. I have been amazed at how you have suggested detail in your landscape quilts and would like to try the same with memorable wildlife events in my life. After returning home from WI to Louisiana my husband and I saw a red fox atop a fallen tree drinking from a lake. The fox was a beautiful rusty red glowing from the setting sun. This quilt is a tall order, but oh, what a memory quilt and learning experience it will be. I will start slow practicing portions of the scene until I am confident enough to tackle the full idea at one time. I am so excited by the challenge.
I am sure all seasons would be great, but I think my first choice would be summer, with so much in bloom.
I would to a spring landscape quilt.
Thank you for the opportunity to enter.
I love landscape quilts! I would have to do one for each season, since I love all the seasons we experience here in Michigan.
I have watched the videos and gathered fabric but haven’t tried yet. I will! No more procrastinating.
I love both winter and fall landscapes. There is so much inspiration in nature to want to recreate it. Thank you!
Fantastic. Amazing how a warm quilt can leave you feeling chilled.
I would do a fall scene, love the colors! But for a first time landscape quilting experience I think a winter scene might be easier to get color and shading right.
I would make a landscape quilt of an autumn scene. I love the golds, reds and oranges that would be in that season’s quilt. Thanks for the chance to win the book that would help get me started.
I live in central Arizona and we rarely see snow. But. In the raging hot summer season. I dream of being in places where the sky is heavy with snow-filled clouds, the trees have a few last wrinkled leaves,and the air is crisp and fresh. Your quilts will inspire me and save me in the coming months and years. Thank you ladies.
I love all the winter scenes, I guess ’cause I love the color blue. But I also love spring & fall. I recently was looking at all the different greens in trees as we drove along the country road home. My college drawing teacher taught me to look closely at various leaves & colors in trees. I just lack enough hours in a day to make a landscape quilt!
My favorite is spring. I have not done a spring landscape yet, maybe this year.
Hi Nancy, Loved reading your post. My choice would be a Fall foliage scene, with a reflection of colorful leaves on a lake.
It is on my bucket list anyway/someday. You sure do know how to make art out of fabric. Thank you for sharing.
An Autumn inspired landscape as I like the warm rich colors of that season.
I would love to do the one that Nancy has in her office. I’ve not done a winter scene before. I did my first landscape quilt after watching Nancy and Natalie’s landscape series. My inspiration was a nearby nature reserve and I won first place in an art contest sponsored by the reserve. Natalie makes the process look so easy and with a little creativity it is. It makes you think outside the ‘squared-off block’ box!
I live in a part of the country where the seasons display only suttle differences. Fall is always my favorite time of year, and as the temperature decreases my need to quilt increases.
Always love your landscape quilts! You make it look so easy. I have a page saved from a magazine that has a forest interior on it. Babbling brook, lots of shadows. And every time I look at it I can see a quilt!
Winter. I love the look of trees glistening in the sun when they are covered with frozen ice and snow.
I have a beautiful backyard with a large pond. I have taken pictures of it in spring, summer, fall, and winter. I would like to make a quilt for each season.
Love your snow scenes which would be nice when you want to cool off in the Florida summers but I like beach scenes with palm trees. I have made ao ocean sunset with dolphins in and out of the water.
How can it be a duplicate when I just wrote this?
Love your snow scenes which would be nice when you want to cool off in the Florida summers but I like beach scenes with palm trees. I have made ao ocean sunset with dolphins in and out of the water.
The quilts are lovely! I’m inspired to give it a try. Thank you for sharing and motivating me!
Any season we be beautiful! Each season has so much beauty. It would actually be hard to decide on just one.
I forgot to state which season! Spring – definitely. Vibrant new greens and plenty of flowers.
The quilts look so real. I like the scene that I still talk to my husband about. It is the scene when we went to pick up my son from college in Bloomington, In. Snow was on the trees. It looked like a postcard. I took a picture of it, but don’t know if we still have it. Thanks
That is a hard one. I like your idea of hanging the quilt over the fireplace…so I think a spring landscape with dogwoods blooming or lilacs blooming and some flowers at their base would be encouraging to see when loading the wood burning insert all winter. I don’t know. Yours are just beautiful, Nancy! Thanks for inspiring!
I’d like to attempt a quilt featuring something of the Georgia landscape, perhaps w some of the historic architecture still prevalent here. I’m from Florida, so there are plenty of images I’d like to incorporate. Last of all, I think it’d be fun to create a quilt of a Tennessee scene, w an actual quilt on display! Thank you for your wonderful videos.
I have been quilting for awhile, but have been afraid to try landscape quilting. I really love yours and would love to learn with you!
I love to quilt and sew year round, but I think autumn would be my favorite to do the landscape quilts. This technique is amazing and I would love to learn more!
I love autumn and would certainly try to capture colorful leaves and bluffs from my childhood’s rural area to make a quilt for my own wall. But I am so intrigued and inspired by your winter landscape examples that I now want to make gift quilts for my sons. My vision for their “winter landscape” wall quilts would have trees in front of a lake so the perspective’s background could feature small ice hockey players on that frozen lake.
You do beautiful landscape quilts. Actually, everything you do is beautiful. Nancy, I can’t thank you enough for what you do. You are the reason I’m sewing and quilting again. I didn’t do much sewing for years but when I retired I wanted to get back into it. I started watching your TV show, videos, and visiting your websites. I have many of your books and DVDs. I have the Beginning Landscaping book and DVD but haven’t been able to start working from the book. I want to make a fall scene first. The colors in the fall leaves are my favorite colors. Thank you again, Nancy. I hope to see you for many years to come.
I have Lots of pictures from a family trip to the Black Hills that I would dearly like to make into a quilt! I have most of the fabrics I want to use. This book would be wonderful to help me to learn the process and to get it completed!
Fall in North Central Wisconsin is absolutely beautiful. I’ve always wished I could paint-this may just be the ticket. Thanks for the inspiration!
I would choose winter for my landscape quilt. Living in the western suburbs of Boston provides me with much inspiration for capturing the birch trees after a snowfall. The view from my living room is a quilt waiting to happen!
Spring would be my choice for a landscape quilt. The freshness of the air. The awakening of all things living. Birds returning to their summer homes. Tilling the garden. Enjoying the sights and smells of the earth as it resumes life once again.
Nancy, it’s toooo cold there. You need to move to sunny California, lol.
I lived a few years in England (South Kent in Birchington’s Minnis Bay Area). I would love to capture the beautiful Summer beach there!! I am new to quilting and am inspired by how well you explain (and how easy) you make everything look!!!! Thank-you!
My husband and I have always loved birch trees. We got to see them on a trip to Wisconsin. Have to do a snowy seen with birch trees!
Another idea to add to my list – I would love to do the fall, with all the beautiful fall colors.
How amazing! New ideas, I love them Thank you, Susan
I love fall with it’s beautiful colors. Since l love the beach, I also would do a beach scene.
I live in Florida near the beach and would love to see beach scenes…
Fall is my favorite season, the colors and possibilities are endless to beautiful scenes in fabrics. I have many fabrics in my stash for this season. Can’t wait to start. I plan on viewing your videos for a refresher. Kathleen
Winter! The beautiful white snow, the setting sun, and the contrasting trees would make a gorgeous landscape quilt. I have seen your quilts in person and they are so inspirational!
I grew up in the Rocky Mountains and would love to capture their majesty in quilts. I live in the flat land of the Rio Grande Valley now and I do miss the sense of security that the mountains gave me.
I love the colors of Fall; rich, vibrant shades of oranges, golds and reds. It’s always been one of my favorite seasons to photograph! How fun it would be to put them to fabric!
lstangl482 at aol dot com
Summer for me. I have a picture in my mind and a sketch in my pad of what I want to do. I’ve started collecting different materials to make this happen but still lack enough knowledge and may confidence to start. I have been trying to absorb everything I can on how to make a landscape quilt. This book might just be the thing that helps me stop dreaming and start doing.
Oh, this looks like SO much fun! I would love to try it with your method. There are so many possibilities and no two would ever be alike. Thanks for the inspiration! I would love to have this book in my library of fun stuff to try with quilting.
I would love to do a fall scene. I love the smells and the crispness in the air.
I would choose Spring as the season I’d love to ‘landscape’ in a quilt/wall hanging.
Fall! Love fall colors in landscape quilts!
Love your landscapes! I have photos of a tree in my mother’s front yard that reflect every season. It is my thought to make these into landscape quilts as a permanent rememberance of my parents longtime home.
Marilyn
I’m drawn to this technique each time I see it. I am determined to learn it and your resources will be a great help. I’m no artist but want to learn this. I think starting with winter will be the plan. Thanks for the inspiration!!
Fall. i have been sewing since I was 3 years old. Landscape quilts is the reason I am Learning how to do basic quilting (there really is not such a thing
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I have been hoarding fabric and the photos/inspiration for years.
Laurie