Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Wednesday's Wanderings #5 - Key West Conch House

 

 Key West has it's own architectural style of houses.  Often they make me smile with their gingerbread detailing, simple style and pastel colors.   Although they are not all painted pink or blue, they do have similar characteristics to suit the tropical climate.   They are called conch (pronounced konk) houses since they were originally made from ground up conch shells.  Although conch shells are no longer used in their construction, they typically have galvanized steel roofs, ventilating roof hatches, window shutters and porches with an overhang. All of this "to beat the heat". 

Here is a sampling of some of my photos:





This is a photo of my favorite breakfast spot, Blue Heaven.  It's an outdoor restaurant with the best pancakes, all served with roaming roosters and cats.

I used fusible machine applique to create this block. 
 A machine blanket stitch was used to stitch it down. 


I also used machine stitching for the porch railing.


The most fun was creating the palm fronds.  I wanted them to be 3-D.  To achieve this, I fused 2 pieces of fabric, back to back.  Then I cut it out. 
 I only stitch the fronds down the middle to achieve dimensionality.

 

7 comments:

  1. Love the colorful houses! You are having way too much fun doing this.

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  2. The houses are so charming and you have captured that charm in your block.

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  3. I'll bet you could make an entire king size quilt of all those cool houses. very nice

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  4. Those houses remind me of old bungalows in India!
    Cute block! We missed you yesterday!

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  5. Buy the pink house!
    Debbi F

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  6. This is my repsonse for the 2 women from Norway planning a visit thei March. I don't se your comment and you did not leave an e-mail address. Key West is a wonderful place to visit to enjoy the tropical climate, music, restaurants and ocean activities. Although there are a bunch of art galleries, there is virtually no fiber on display. There is one quilt shop with predominantly tropical type fabrics. There is the Studio of Key West, where Susan Lenz is teaching a one day fiber workshop. I', not sure of the date or exact topic, but look to www.tskw.org. I am not familiar with the rest of Florida. Have a nice vacation.

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    1. Hello again! Thank you for your answer! we will take this into account when planning further!
      love from elisabet (elisabet.saksen@gmail.com)

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