The Ugly Fabric Challenge Results

Well, the UFC, Ugly Fabric Challenge (not to be confused with Ultimate Fighting Championship!), has been revealed and, holy cow, are my fellow guild members ever good at making something beautiful out of ugly!

Since every guild around the world is unable to meet in person, Zoom has become the Twisted Stitchers' way of keeping in touch with each other. There are a few very small groups (mine included) stemming from our guild that continue to be a part of each others' bubbles, but the group as a whole is missing our monthly meetings and sew days in person. Our executive has worked extremely hard to keep us all connected during this crazy ass year of 2020 with guest speakers and even sew days done through the wonderful world of technology.

And now a reminder of the rules for our UFC:

Whoever wished to take part in this challenge brought 2 fat quarters (to our Christmas party last December) of what they deemed to be an ugly fabric to guild. Two names were drawn from the bag and those 2 people had to give each other one of their fat quarters...so you now have 2 ugly fabrics that have to “play nice together”. Sue and I were lucky that our fabrics actually didn't suck when put together...others were not so lucky!

The following month (January 2020) we each had to come back to guild with a coordinate to share as well so we had at least 4 fabrics to work with. Participants were also allowed to add other coordinates to the mix. To the right you will see the mix I used.

Sue's tablerunner beautifully highlighted her wonderful free motion skills. Each curvy section showcased a different stitch pattern. She nailed it!

My solution was to camouflage the fabrics by using them in smaller bits in order for the ugly to not be so noticeable. Bargello designs have a way of doing that so all you focus on is the design play of lights and darks and line.

Of course not everyone's idea of ugly is the same. For me it wasn't the design of the fabric that I deemed ugly, but the colour combinations. Others may love the colour combinations. Therefore the old saying “beauty (or in this case, ugly) is in the eye of the beholder” really rings true.

I hope you enjoyed seeing our interpretation of the challenge. So, when your guild issues a challenge I hope you'll be brave enough to give it a go!