Shades in Midnight is a mottled print quilting cotton from Riley Blake Designs, made from 100% cotton. The mottling is the point: unlike a flat solid, the tonal variation gives the surface something to look at while staying quiet enough to sit behind a busier print. On a very dark ground the effect is more pronounced than you might expect — a flat black or navy can look heavy and inert across a quilt top, while mottling keeps depth in the color and stops it reading as a hole in the design.
The fabric works three ways in a project. As a background it grounds a quilt and frames bright prints with maximum contrast, which is why dark blenders anchor night-sky, celestial and Halloween projects. As binding it defines the edge firmly and gives the quilt a clean finished boundary. And on its own it holds as a feature fabric when the construction is doing the visual work. A dark ground is also the practical choice for bag exteriors and anything handled often. This listing is fabric only: no pattern, batting, thread or notions are included.
