My Bella Pattern Revamped for Wonderfil Threads

I took my drawing of my Bella pattern and enlarged it to 24" square and adapted it to a more realistic version. Some things are similar but there are much more hair strands, skin tone shading and eye detail. I was asked by Wonderfil Threads from Calgary, Alberta Canada to make a wall hanging quilt. I have been one of their featured teachers and I receive perks from the company so I thought it was honorable to make a quilt, when they asked me, which will be displayed when the company vends at markets and festivals. The idea of pink hair came from me while working in a hair salon and reading all the ads in hair stylist publications and the trend has been vibrant colored hair. I chose pink because it's my favorite color! I selected blue/turquoise for the eye shadow because it was a color in the background fabric and it seemed retro-like in a 1960s kind of way. When selecting the lip color I stayed with the 1960s theme and chose a lighter pink to mimic the frosted lips of the decade a la Twiggy and Mary Quant!!

This is a starting point photo of the applique pieces fused and cut out and the background and binding fabrics chosen. The applique pieces are then fused to the background and with 7 different colors of hair it was a bit complicated! Could I turn this into a pattern-it would be hard to explain the process and order to fuse the applique pieces to the background fabric. The whole fusing process is like putting a jigsaw puzzle together!!

This is a photo of the details of the face. I used only Wonderfil Threads since this project was about their products. Some of the threads used were Fabulux rayon thread which has a beautiful shimmer on the hair; 40 wt rayon variegated for the eyes and mouth and Egyptian cotton "Tutti" in  variegated browns for the skin tones. I embellished with loose chunky glitter on the eyelid for "eyeliner," nail polish on the mouth and eye shadow areas; a rhinestone for a nose piecing and a variety of rainbow colored beads hand sewn to form a necklace. I will be sending this one onto the Wonderfil folks and plan to make another version for myself with a woman of color with red hair and green eye shadow!!