Color is at the heart of every quilt. It’s what gives your design its mood, its vibrance, and its voice. Yet for many quilters, choosing colors can feel daunting. The good news is, color inspiration is everywhere, it’s just a matter of training your eye and trusting your instincts.

Mastering Color with Purpose and Play

In The Quilter’s Guide to Color, GE Designs walks us through color theory tailored for quilts. The series begins with the fundamentals - dividing the color wheel into primary, secondary and tertiary hues, then exploring complementary, analogous, monochromatic and triadic schemes. These simple wheel-based ideas help you create harmony or high contrast by carefully selecting three to five colors and building around them.

The next installment dives into value, the lightness or darkness of a hue, and shows how layering light, medium and dark tones creates depth and keeps your quilt visually interesting. High contrast sparks drama. Low contrast delivers quiet elegance.

In “Making Colors Pop”, bright fabrics take center stage. Pair neon or fiery shades with dark tones - black, navy, charcoal - or crisp white to boost vibrancy. Strategically place bold pops across the quilt to avoid chaos. And when things feel loud, a neutral tone can rescue balance..

Then come pastels. Soft yellows, blush pinks, minty greens, light blues—these calm hues offer endless options. Use them in traditional quilts alongside florals and gingham or let them shine solo in modern, minimal designs, accompanied by gentle neutrals or tonal prints.

Finally, the series tackles common challenges. Mixing prints and solids? Use solids or tone-on-tone prints to give busy fabrics room to breathe. Dull or overly bright quilts? Balance intensity with neutrals, play with contrast, or turn to digital tools or a trusty color wheel for direction

Nature’s Palette

Still feeling stuck? Just step outside. The natural world is an endless well of inspiration. As described in Stitching Nature Into Your Quilts, Gudrun often draws from her surroundings: the crisp blues of thawing lakes in spring, the fiery tones of autumn leaves, the dusty neutrals of a woodland hike.

Start your next project by noticing the color relationships in your everyday world. A walk in the garden might reveal the perfect triadic combo of violet, green, and yellow. A beach day might inspire soft creams, aqua, and driftwood brown. Nature balances saturation and value in ways that can surprise and guide you.

4 Years of Colorful Discovery

Speaking of nature-inspired palettes, Goody’s Color Club has been translating color inspiration into fabric bundles for four years. Each month, subscribers receive curated fabrics based on a theme - shades of ice blue for thawing lakes, golden hues pulled from wheat fields, soft linens inspired by organic textures.

The club was created to help quilters build a usable stash full of versatile, high-quality basics. And it's not just about fabric, it’s about learning, too. Each shipment comes with an inspiration photo and color tips, helping members develop an intuitive sense of what works and why. As shared in the anniversary reflection, the goal is to bring joy, variety, and a little surprise to every month of making.

With the recent updates, the club now offers even more flexibility: half-yard or fat quarter options, a lower price point, and the ability to pause a subscription if needed. It's a great way to stay inspired and keep your creative momentum going.

Your Next Color Story Starts Here

So the next time you're stuck staring at your stash or hesitating to cut into that favorite print, remember: color doesn’t need to be perfect, it needs to be playful, personal, and a reflection of the story you're trying to tell. Use tools like The Quilter’s Guide to Color, take cues from the outdoors, and lean into curated resources like Goody’s Color Club to guide your hand.

Let color be your spark. Your next quilt is waiting.