Recently Cherri has been planning a trip to Hawaii with some friends, and has come up with a lovely idea for travel presents. She wanted to make quilted bags in a typical Hawaiian quilting style and asked me to come up with some applique designs that she could use
I don’t really know anything about Hawaiian quilting apart from the fact that it seems to involve large squares of stylised and appliqued flowers and leaves, invariably done in radially symmetrical designs. I suspect that the design tradition has its roots in the tapa designs of the South Pacific, but that’s only a guess
The designs are simple and fun to do, and rather remind me of the papercuts I used to make as a child. Cherri has interpreted them in brilliant tropical colours and I think the finished bags are stunning