Mini Art Quilts

Years ago, I had made "inchies" to trade with other artists. Mine are actually 1 1/2 inches square.
To make each inchie, I decorated the fabric by painting it, fused the fabric onto a stiff interfacing, some free-motion stitching done, trimmed it to size, and then zig-zag stitched around the edge.

I had several leftover and made them into pendants, but didn't like how they came out. Today, I took out a package of glass beads that I bought when I was at The International Quilt Festival in Houston and some wire, and I redesigned my inchies. To add the beads at the top end, I looped the wire, added the beads to the wire, looped the wire under the beads, and sewed the bottom loop of the wire to the back of the inchie. To add the beads to the bottom of the inchie, I sewed the beads on with silamide thread. I attached a surgical stainless steel chain that I bought on Amazon. Here are the results. I'm linking this post to Off The Wall Friday where you can visit other art quilt blogs. Please make comments to let the artists know you where there.

Painted on commercial fabric

Painted on commercial fabric and some foil applied

Background painted on a dryer sheet
Heart appliqued on top

Center is thread-painted

Here's a photo of the back so you can see how the wire is attached to the top. I sewed it on using the silamide thread, too. The black square is a piece of sticky back (soft side) velcro from my first attempt at making the pendants way back when. I'm leaving it on for now for the added weight because it may serve to keep the pendant facing forward as I wear it. I've noticed that sometimes lightweight necklaces tend to flip over as I wear them when I move around. I'll see how these wear as I move.

back of necklace at top