Quilting Books
Best Modern & Design-Forward Quilting Books
Modern quilting books favor bold negative space, improvisational piecing, and a design-first approach over traditional block repetition.
All modern & design-forward books
Amy Butler's Midwest Modern: A Fresh Design Spirit for the Modern Lifestyle
Amy Butler
Amy Butler's breakout collection of bold, large-scale florals and graphic quilt and home-décor projects that helped define early-2000s modern quilting.
See details
Denyse Schmidt Quilts: 30 Colorful Quilt and Patchwork Projects
Denyse Schmidt
Thirty quilt and patchwork projects from Denyse Schmidt, built on improvisational, asymmetrical takes on traditional blocks that helped launch the modern quilting movement.
See details
Denyse Schmidt: Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration
Denyse Schmidt
A follow-up collection pairing classic antique-quilt inspiration with Denyse Schmidt's modern, improvisational piecing sensibility.
See details
The Practical Guide to Patchwork: New Basics for the Modern Quiltmaker
Elizabeth Hartman
Elizabeth Hartman's foundational modern-quilting guide, teaching negative space, improvisational curves, and confident color choices alongside a dozen original patterns.
See details
Quilting Modern: Techniques and Projects for Improvisational Quilts
Jacquie Gering & Katie Pedersen
A hands-on introduction to improvisational piecing techniques — improv curves, wonky stars, string piecing — paired with a dozen full quilt patterns.
See details
Quilting with a Modern Slant
Rachel May
May profiles dozens of modern quilters alongside patterns and essays on how the modern quilt movement developed. The book mixes project instructions with interviews, giving context for design choices rather than just technique. A good pick for readers as interested in the movement's history and community as in the patterns themselves.
See details
Modern Quilts: Designs of the New Century
Modern Quilt Guild
Published by the Modern Quilt Guild, this collection surveys quilts and makers who defined the movement's early years, organized around recurring design themes like negative space and improvisation. It functions more as a visual survey and reference than a project-by-project instruction manual. Best suited to quilters looking for design inspiration and movement context rather than step-by-step patterns.
See details
Urban Quilting
Wendy Chow
Chow draws on architecture and city environments — grids, skylines, signage — as source material for quilt patterns, translating those shapes into modern piecing. The book includes a set of city-inspired projects with cutting and piecing instructions. Geared toward quilters who want a graphic, urban-influenced aesthetic grounded in a specific visual theme.
See details
The Modern Quilt Workshop
Bill Kerr & Weeks Ringle
One of the earlier titles credited with helping define modern quilting as a category, this book emphasizes design thinking — color, scale, negative space — over rote pattern-following. Kerr and Ringle include projects but frame them as starting points for readers to adapt. Suited to quilters who already have piecing basics down and want to develop their own design eye.
See details
Quilts Made Modern
Bill Kerr & Weeks Ringle
A follow-up to the pair's earlier work, this title offers original patterns built around modern design principles like asymmetry and bold color blocking. Each project includes full cutting and piecing instructions along with notes on the design decisions behind it. Works well for quilters ready to move past traditional block patterns into more graphic compositions.
See detailsModern Patchwork
Elizabeth Hartman
Hartman, a well-known modern quilt pattern designer, offers a set of original patchwork patterns ranging from simple to more involved, each with clear piecing diagrams. The projects lean toward clean geometric shapes and controlled color palettes typical of her pattern line. A solid choice for confident beginner to intermediate quilters wanting modern patterns with reliable instructions.
See detailsAs an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. We may also earn a commission from other links on this page, at no extra cost to you. Learn more.
Frequently Asked Questions
What's the best modern & design-forward quilting book?+
Look for the book marked "Teresa's Pick" at the top of this page — that's NiftyFifty founder Teresa Drummond's personal recommendation for modern & design-forward. Below it you'll find 11 more books covering the same category from different authors and angles.
Do I need more than one modern & design-forward book?+
Not usually. Most quilters do fine with one solid reference for a given technique — pick the one whose author's teaching style clicks with you, work through it, and only add a second if you outgrow the first or want a different perspective.