Tips on Mixing Fabrics

Thank you all for playing along with the Thrifty Monday party! I'm excited that you all enjoyed it and will look forward to next week. I had no idea how many would participate, so now that the word is out, I'm sure more will join in next week too.

Also, next week, on Wed., May 6th, I'm going to host a Garden party so get your pics ready to share. It will be a fun pre-summer fling to show off what's blooming in your yard OR what projects you are up to outside. I've been working my butt off in my flower beds the last couple of weeks getting some flowers planted, beds mulched and look forward to sharing. Come on back for the Garden Party next Wednesday! Grab the button & spread the news!

Growing up with a mom who sewed everything for us, I spent many hours following her around the fabric stores near our house wishing she would hurry up. I can still remember the old warehouse fabric store with bins and bolts of fabrics, but I wasn’t that interested as a young girl in the fabrics that came home with us to be made into a dress or blouse or something for us girls. She made all our clothes as youngsters and it was a happy day when I got to be a teen and earned enough money to buy some “store-bought” clothes, especially jeans and some fun pants. She even made Barbie clothes for us. We really lived a frugal life in those days. But, when I got older and bought my first house, I really was excited that my mom could sew. I spent hours dreaming of pretty window treatments and what I would do with all those windows waiting to be adorned. Mom was always willing to give it a try even if she wasn’t sure how it would turn out and she has sewed many window treatments for me over the years. I love the ones in my house to this day.

(all from Fabric.com)

So, someone mentioned to me that they would love to hear about choosing fabrics and putting window treatments together, so that’s what we’ll talk about today. I dearly love caressing a pretty fabric now and really have to stay out of the fabric stores unless I’m looking for something specific or I could talk myself into buying all new fabrics and bringing them home. All those colors and pretty fabrics grab my attention every time. And mixing and matching patterns is so much fun to me now.

(All by Robert Allen)

I’m not a total expert on mixing fabrics, but I think I have a pretty good eye for putting things together that work. I learned to mix stripes with florals and if you choose a main large print, then to make sure the other fabrics don’t compete with that. Choose your main fabric, then coordinate with it. I love stripes and florals or florals and checks or plaids. You can always throw in a small patterned print with those too. It really gets fun when you add in a couple more prints to the mix and I enjoy a room with about 4 to 6 different fabrics. So, how do you mix them without them looking like a hodge-podge? Well, as I mentioned, start with a main fabric, add a solid or near solid, a stripe or plaid, a mini-print, and go from there. You want to be sure the colors all relate to each other and nothing looks out of place when you line them all up.

(All by Robert Allen)

Take a look at all of these fabrics I found online from Fabric.com. I thought these were good examples of mixing patterns. I know some people have a really hard time mixing fabrics, but it has always come pretty easily for me. I probably play it safe for the most part and am not nearly as adventurous as the designers out there are, but this method works for me. See if any of these appeal to you.

(First Fabric: Robert Allen; next Bosporus)

(All by Waverly)

(Robert Allen)

In my own master bedroom, there are many fabric patterns in there and I think they all work together. I had a good time playing around with all of these when I was picking them out. I got the paisley and striped blues from Calico Corners and all the rest from other sources.

The main fabric that I chose first was the paisley, then I added the stripe and all the others. Since I wanted to bring gold in the mix, I used a small gold check and the small blue check with gold dots. The silk large check is just one accent pillow and the floral blue and gold brings it together too. So, you see you can have a lot of fun with mixing fabrics. Just let your creativity flow with it and your plans will all come together.

I’ve always loved custom window treatments (not the really high-end designer ones), but it scares a lot of people because of the price of fabric and labor. I’ve always had free labor with my mom, so that has helped me tremendously. But, there are plenty of ladies out there who still do sewing in their homes. Buying the perfect fabrics and having them sewed by someone is still very cost effective if you’re going for a more custom look in a room. Off the rack window treatments have also really improved in recent years too and now longer lengths can be found, but there is still nothing like picking the fabrics you love and putting them together for a custom look. To me it's totally worth it!

I hope this helped a little with choosing fabrics and how to mix and match them for a fun room. I’ll do another post soon about window treatments and how I’ve put those together in my own house. I’m very fortunate to have a sewing Mama and she has sewed so many things for me over the years. She’s almost 81 now, so I really don’t like to ask her to do a lot of sewing for me anymore and now that I found a bargain sewing machine at a yardsale last year, I really want to learn to sew a few things myself. I will never be as good as she is though!

We’ll talk window treatments in more detail soon!

Tim, the Remodeling Guy, is hosting a Spring Round-up Party on Friday, so I'll be posting mine a day early on Thursday and linking to his party on Friday. I've got a fun fountain project that I've finished up outside and can't wait to share. Click the pic and go on over to Tim's and check it out if you'd like to participate too.