A Personalized Present

My friends Kit & Nolan moved out of the city and down onto the wide water where the Patapsco River joins the Chesapeake Bay. They love the life down there, but we miss them up here in the heart of the city and I don’t see them nearly as much as I did when they were just a mile or two away from my old house.

I knew I wanted to give them a unique “housewarming” present, and struggled to think of something that would be personal and practical. A few weeks ago, I came upon the perfect solution.

Using the old nautical charts I’d found on-line, I picked one with the section of coast where they live. I chose one of a 1906 chart of the oyster bars off their point, and downloaded it.

Then I worked my Photoshop magic with it and came up with this image.

Next, I went over to Spoonflower, a company which prints custom fabric. I played with the proportions and figured that I needed something that would measure 21x21 inches and I wanted at least six copies of the image.Their service is very easy to use and the fabric came less than a week after I ordered it.

Then I got to work sewing.I wanted to make a couple of pillows for Kit and Nolan’s great-room which overlooks the water. After playing around with some piping, I decided that the oyster white would be best. The white-white was too bright and the red distracted from the print. I used down/feather pillow forms from Ikea in the 20x20 size, hence the 21 inch repeat.

A few hours of pinning, pressing, sewing, pinning and sewing later, I finished the pillows…Just in time to meet Kit and Nolan on a rare visit to my part of town and a nice dinner and catch-up! And they loved the pillows…