A Forgotten Italian Villa - Quilt fabric collection

Intro

These fabric collection designs are inspired by a 16th century Italian villa - the Villa dei Vescovi, near Padua. I added a little Mannerism to my designs because I cannot resist doing so. Hopefully you will find these designs inspiring to use in your own craft projects.

All designs are available at my Spoonflower shop - and available on fabric & wallpaper.

The Fabric Collection Designs

The first design in this collection, is a wallpaper design. I kept the idea of a large scale design and the sweeping curving idea from the villa, but I turned the design into flowers and leaves. I tried to soften my 3D effect, wanting to still suggest it not being flat, but to look more like something on a wall. One of the challenges of creating art, is thinking about how to do something you have done previously, but in a different way.

The second design in this collections, is a marble. This is the first marble design that I have made. When I first started using Substance Designer, I tried to make marble, but my skills were so lacking, that I could not accomplish what seemed like a simple task. I did make a small bit of marble that went into a flower design a year ago, but other than that, this is my first marble design.

Marble seems like a simple thing to design. I spent a few hours playing with colors and noise patterns to get a fairly real-looking result. I also explored how different colors, with some transparency, change colors as they overlap the other colors.

The third design in this collection, is a stucco for an exterior wall. I put the diagonal metal-looking cross bracing (which I was very tempted to turn into wood lattice and put roses and vines on instead) on the wall as if it is supporting the old wall. The actual building has frescos and trompe-l'œil paintings on the walls - one of which had diagonal crossing lines like these —- so I turned them into these metal bands. I intentionally went for a rough look and harsh shadows here - for an old wall on a sunny day.

The fourth design, is a brick. Basic orange brick. I played around with the colors, purple, orange, pale yellow, and white - exploring mixing the colors and over-lapping them - to create a look of orange brick but not literally orange. I have found giving the colors irregularity adds to the real look. I want these to look real - or possibly real - but not be confused as being actually real (or a photograph). I did give the bricks some shape variation, but kept a traditional steady running bond.

The fifth design is frenchwood doors with a landscape view outside. The villa has frenchwood doors. They are not built the way doors are generally built, and I chose to follow this non-traditional design. So they look a little funny - though I find it to be a compelling design. I made the landscape fairly abstract as it is in the distance. It substitutes for the glass being plain, by giving it color as if it were stained glass.

The sixth design is old wooden storm doors. Like the frenchwood doors, these are assembled like picture frames put together - not the way we see doors assembled normally. Like the stucco and brick designs, this is something old that has been left outside and gotten beat by wind and rain over centuries with minimal care.

Design number seven, is a interior scene composed of the wallpaper, marble, and frenchwood designs comprising this collection. I like to make scenes for my collections. This interior scene, I’m trying for a smooth, soft shadows, low yellow-ish light scene. I really wanted it to suggest being inside a room.

The eighth and final design, is an exterior scene —- the outside of the interior scene. The exterior is rough, lit by sunshine dappled by a shady tree.

Outro

As I made these designs, I spent a lot of time thinking about lighting - soft or harsh. And about shade and shadows. I want to explore more variety in my shading and shadowing - colors, textures, uneven-ness, harsh or soft, as I continue to make designs and explore as an artist.