Sycamore leaves

The room this quilt will eventually go in has been decorated with stencilled sycamore branches. The leaf shape was too complex for the size of the appliqued leaves, so I added a few in the quilting:

I filled all the rest of the background with this swirly pattern. It has a similar effect to McTavishing (which I often use on my smaller tree quilts) but I find it easier to quilt at a larger scale - which is not only much faster, but more suitable for a larger quilt. It's especially suitable in an autumn quilt, having the appearance of wind blowing the leaves off the tree.

It also fits quite nicely into the odd spaces between the branches and is quite adaptable.