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Backstitch at the National Quilt Museum in Paducah

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My quilt in Paducah


Backstitch: A 25 Year Retrospective of Advances & Milestones in Quiltmaking, an exhibit celebrating the silver anniversary of the New England Quilt Museum, is now at the The National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky through September 16, 2014. Curators are Anita Loscalzo and Laura Lane.

Hickory Leaf by Barbara Brackman,
2003
Quilted by Lori Kukuk

I was pleased to send a quilt. At the original venue at the New England Quilt Museum I loaned the Hickory Leaf above, an interpretation of an antique quilt from about 1840. That quilt was not available (I couldn't find it until last week as I am moving from my Victorian house of 40 years) so I sent another reproduction, also an interpretation of an antique from about 1830-1850.

Birds in the Air
by Barbara Brackman
1993-1998

I hand pieced this quilt (except for the strip set), one reason it took so long to make. The other reason
is that this is the last large quilt I did before I started designing reproduction prints for Moda, so finding the perfect period prints was a challenge. A shopping challenge, which I will always accept.

The brown-ground chintz was curtain fabric from Calico Corners. The setting triangles are cut from a great Pilgrim/Roy print, still one of my favorites.

More information about the Backstitch exhibit:

Nameless Star Variations

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From an online auction, mid 19th-century
I did a post a few weeks ago on this old pattern without a name---
a star with satellites. 

An example from Olde Hope Antiques

Embroidered on the reverse of this one:  "Noctem quitam, et finem perfectum concedat nobis Dominus ominpotens. R. Amen," Latin for "May the almighty Lord grant us a quiet night and a perfect end. Amen" 


While looking at examples I found lots of variations.

From Berks County, Pennsylvania

In some the satellites were less complex.

Here's one dated 1929





In some you get the feeling she threw in whatever was
hanging around from the last project...


This was on the cover of Quilters' Newsletter years ago.


By Mrs. Elijah Edwards, Wayne County, North Carolina
from the North Carolina project and the Quilt Index

In a few the satellite stars are more complex.

Laurie Simpson of Minnick & Simpson was inspired by an antique quilt
to do her Lone Star reproduction pattern, which is similar
to Mrs. Edwards's quilt above.

From an exhibit at Quilt Market

From the Thomas K Woodard collection in an old
Quilt Engagement Calendar.

From the Shelburne Museum Collection

Richmond Reds plus Yellow for Jane Austen

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Block #1 Bright Star for Jane Austen

Here's the post for the first block:


Block 2
Sister's Choice for Cassandra Austen

Georgann's been using my latest reproduction collection Richmond Reds
to make up the free weekly pattern. She's adding a few golds and yellows from her stash.
(I gave her my preview pre-cut package, which should be available in shops any day)

The colorways also feature browns and olives
but red is the theme.




Block 3 
Cross Within Cross for the Rev. George Austen

Block 4
Thrifty with a toile from the scrapbag


Georgann's also adding toiles---after all, the block of the week series is about Jane Austen
who was born in the time of toile.


Block 6
Empire Star

Block 7
Philadelphia Block

Block 8 Eliza's Star

Block 9
London Roads

Block 10
Good Fortune

Block 11
Friendship 
The center is another scrapbag toile.

Block 21
West Wind

We're up to Block 22, scheduled for this Sunday, and I'm working now
on digitally drawing the last  patterns for the 36 weekly intallments, which will be posted
in November and December, 2014.

Check out our Flickr page to see what others are up to.

Sign up using your email address and you'll get a weekly email with the pattern and the story.
http://austenfamilyalbumquilt.blogspot.com/

Arts and Crafts at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London

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Queen Victoria laid the foundation stone for the
facade of the South Kensington Museum in 1899
when it was renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Courtyard, perhaps the original 1857 facade.
The Museum's website gives its history:

"The Museum was established in 1852, following the enormous success of the Great Exhibition the previous year. Its founding principle was to make works of art available to all, to educate working people and to inspire British designers and manufacturers. Profits from the Exhibition were used to establish the Museum of Manufactures, as it was initially known, and exhibits were purchased to form the basis of its collections. The Museum moved to its present site in 1857 and was renamed the South Kensington Museum."

We found a hotel within a few blocks of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, so we could visit often. My first question at the door was where to see Arts & Crafts items. They have a room in the British Galleries devoted to the style.

Here is one of my favorites: a silk collar designed and stitched by 
Jessie Newbery of Glasgow


Most of the museums we went to
permit you to take photos without flash,
which is a great way to make notes.

On display were samples by various British designers
of the aesthetic movement, including C. F. A. Voysey with
a piece of his owl fabric.

I took this fuzzy picture of an inlaid Liberty chair
with its 13 square spindles because I
recently found a pair of chairs with 12 square
spindles at an estate sale. I'm still trying to
identify my chairs. I certainly identified the inspiration.

Embroidered table runner by Frances Mary Templeton, 
1909, perhaps stitched in a Glasgow class taught by Ann Macbeth.

A few more fuzzy pictures....
I  took these as reminders to look up a much better
photo in their online catalog.

The museum's image.


A panel from a Manxman piano designed by Mackay Hugh Baillie Scott. 

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O78955/manxman-piano-baillie-scott-mackay/


Woven silk, Kingfisher by Bruce Talbert

William Morris's handwritten recipe

Roseanne and the girls (we traveled with two recent college graduates)
 spent time in the natural history museum
down the street. It's filled with impressive bas-relief
animal sculpture.

We also liked this bench for visitor seating at the V & A.

This museum has an excellent on-line catalog with  414,228 images. Browse it here:

The catalog is a great design resource, but it will only make you long to see the objects in real life.

Epic Moving Sale

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This building is supposed to be my studio
but things have piled up out there.

After 40 years of owning the same house
I am moving.

I am leaving this cute little Victorian cottage
in Lawrence Kansas
("Little" is the significant word)



And having a sale on September 5th & 6th, 2014.


I am putting out lots of quilts even though the market
isn't very good. Buy high, sell low is my motto.

Several have been pictured in my books.

Then there is fabric new and old.

And then there is junk from the attic.
Here Deb is handing me stuff through the pull-down attic stairs.

A precarious trip. She and Georgann were
brave to help me. 


The mover guys told me they were too fat
to go up there so I had to recruit agile women.

We also threw a lot of stuff down the ladder.

What survived I cleaned up and put some price tags on.

There will be many useful items.

I am saving the BEST of my wooden bird collection
and selling the rest.

I am selling the best of my reverse painting on glass
with a quilt theme (I actually only have one and I do not need
this in the new house which has a modern theme.) You may need
it in your house. 

Here's the poster.
Friday, Saturday this week.
500 Louisiana, Lawrence, KS

And here is the new modern house before I junk it up.

I have 2 pieces of advice:
1) Never live anywhere for 40 years. Keep moving.
2) Never put anything in a storage spot when you are 30 that you cannot get out when you are 60.

Tim Quilts with Ladies' Album Jellyroll

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 Tim Latimer, one of my favorite bloggers, is interpreting an old quit top from about 1890-1910 in a signature quilt.

I am pleased to see he is making good use of a Jellyroll
of 2-1/2" precut strips from my Ladies' Album reproduction collection
for Moda.



He gathered signatures from friends
and is alternating two 6" blocks, a  nine-patch with a snowball block.

The two-block design has been popular for
a century or more. In my BlockBase program for PC's it's #1001. 


Here's a finished quilt similar to Tim's but the blocks are set on point.

I'd give you a pattern name but there
are many to choose from.
BlockBase lists 19, with perhaps the
 two earliest published names:
"Flagstones" from the Ladies Art Company catalog
"New Snowball" from Hearth & Home magazine,
both published about 1910.
Most of us call it "Snowball."

Tim's right: it makes a great signature quilt. See his how-to here:
http://timquilts.com/2014/08/15/signature-block-piecing/

Vintage top from the same time period, different color scheme.
The gray was probably once green or blue.

Quilting Bees: Romance and Magic

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 Enoch Wood Perry: The Two Sewers (A Quilting Party), 1875

The social aspects of cooperative quilting around
a frame have captured the eye of many painters of "Americana."
Perry's paintings reflects a post-Civil-War nostalgia for the past.

One of his sewers tells us a lot about how body language
changes. I'd swear she was answering her cell phone,
but she's holding a spool of thread to her head.
Why, I do not know.

UPDATE: Nicole has a clue.
The woman with cell phone is measuring out a length of thread. Look at her other hand! I measure mine hand to heart, but hand to ear works as well.

I measure mine to my elbow (doubled)

UPDATE 2
Jayne has another clue

 I think cell phone lady is cutting the thread with her teeth. See how her mouth is held, and her teeth are showing? I would never have noticed it if you hadn't updated about measuring a length of thread. Yes, I have done that, and I used to be able to cut thread with my teeth.


The other sewer is intent on her work (she's probably got her phone turned off). 
The magic here is in the frame. What is holding it up?

For my Civil War Quilts blog I've been writing about
authentic mid-19th-century quilting frames and I found
out quickly that one gets a lot more information from
photographs than paintings.

Perry's Girl Quilting, date-inscribed 1885,
indicates his interest in the subject. But
over ten years he didn't learn a thing about
how quilting frames are supported.

The quilt top looks historically accurate. As does the pegged frame
with holes, but I've not seen anyone put the peg
in at a diagonal.

I cannot read the signature on this image
but the artist uses the same artistic license
as Perry. The frame's strong horizontal line
is reason enough to paint it. Who cares how
it's held up?
UPDATE: I see the signature is E.W. Perry
so it's a third of his quilting images. Again the cross
bar is pegged at an angle.

Morgan Weistling is a contemporary painter who often uses quilts in his nostalgic imagery. It's the kind of image that makes a historian wince. The kid's shiny face under the quilt gives me the cynical willies too.The quilt's wrong for the era he's attempting to depict, but the whole thing is a historical mishmash...

including the magic of the frame's suspension. Note that
rickety hand-made chair.
The whole idea would make Dorothy Parker frow up.
But I digress...

Edgar Melville Ward, Quilting Party, 1892
Collection of the International Quilt Study Center & Museum

Other artists seem more attentive to the actual
mechanics of the quilting party.

Henry Mosler's  Quilting Bee, painted about 1890,
depicts an 18th-century event.

The quilter on the left uses the ladder-back
chair that holds up the frame as a worktable.

(In looking at this a little closer I am confused. Is
the chair holding up the frame or the frame holding
the chair?)

On the right the frame is supported by the
arm of a larger chair. I wouldn't want
to be the woman who has to share my chair
with the frame. You couldn't wiggle much.

Quilting nostalgia at an 1864 Sanitary Fair

The woman in the center foreground here
has the same problem. I'd be bringing my folding
chair if I had to sit like this.

Quilting Party by Pauline Jackson, about 1955

Jackson's frame has sturdy supports and everybody
gets their own chair.

The Quilting Bee by Anna Mary Robertson, 1940s.

The painter known as Grandma Moses had trouble
depicting real space, part of the charm of her naive
paintings. The dining table and the quilting frame
are held up in similar, rather unbelievable fashion,

Don't lean on the end of either.

The artist's best bet is to just ignore
the mechanics and focus on the
quilt. (I hope the bottled beverages
here never fizz over.)

Of course, these painters are "artists," and each has an artistic
license. Faith Ringold has invited Vincent Van Gogh
to her quilting bee, and you KNOW you
can't really do that. You also KNOW the quilt
is not a magic carpet.

See more serious discussion of the mechanics of the quilting frame at my Civil War Quilts
blog last weekend.



Richmond Reds: Projects & Kits

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Richmond Reds
79" x 79"

For every Moda fabric collection our pattern designers work with the fabric designer to come up with a "Project Sheet." Susan Stiff and I collaborated on this star design for Richmond Reds, which is being shipped to stores in September. The above quilt has been packaged as a kit. You can pre-order now.

But we aren't the only designers coming up with ideas for kits and patterns. I am glad to see some "crowd sourcing" going on at Etsy and EBay. 

Me thinking up ideas

This means I do not have to come up with all the clever ideas for how to use my pre-cuts and yardage. Other people do it too.

I love it. 
You can buy these kits with patterns online.

Here are two searches to click on:

Etsy

EBay




Scroll down and see what's up. Or do searches for these words:

Moda Kit Richmond Reds




You'll find kits for many other lines too. If you see a fabric collection you like
do a search for kits.


Richmond Reds: Document Print for Austin

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Every mid-19th-century reproduction collection
needs a sprigged floral.

Austin from Richmond Reds for Moda

The 19th-century scrapbag was full of small-scale sprigged cotton prints,
a standard for clothing for young and old


from the "sprigged muslin" of Jane Austen's era.....


Fiction from 1797 in which a 
young woman complains that her husband has denied her
 "a small sum to purchase a piece of sprigged muslin,
 which struck my fancy."

to fashion advice from The Delineator in 1922:

"Sprigged cotton prints are made into quaint little dresses with straight lower edges and separate knickers."

A sprigged cotton according to the Oxford Dictionary of English, is "decorated with a design of sprigs of leaves or flowers..."


The document print for Austin.
(The document is the original antique fabric.)
I dated it as about 1860 to 1890, although these small sprigs are 
such classics they run throughout the 19th century and into the 20th.

A swatch of #8306-11
the reproduction.

The Austin print comes in two shades
of pink as well as brown, tan and red.



Buy yards of it! I'm telling you:

You'll find it useful for reproductions from all eras.

Antique quilt about 1820-1840

About 1840-1860

About 1840-1860


About 1870-1890

About 1870-1890

About 1880-1920


About 1880-1920

'

Why did I name it Austin?
I was looking for city names North and South for this Civil-War era
collection and that town in Texas has a ring...

Austen/Austin

Quilting Parties of Questionable Accuracy

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The Brothers Assist in the Quilting, Harper's Weekly, 1863

I've been posting about vintage images of quilting parties here and at my 
Civil War Quilts blog.
The wood engraving above seems to represent the end
of the work and the beginning of the supper. 

The cook in the kitchen is one of many women laughing
at the men trying to thread needles. Why they are threading
needles after the quilting is finished I cannot say.
Perhaps they are binding the quilt.


Quilting Party, 1849

The similarities between this 1849 illustration and the 1863 picture
indicate the earlier engraving as a source for the other.
Women are either binding a quilt or the artist knew
very little about how quilts were quilted.


A Gilbert, Leisure Hours, 1890

Gilbert seems to have a good idea of how an 1890 quilt might
look but the finished quilt is more for visual effect than showing
how quilts are made.

The visual effect is always important.
You see a lot more pictures of women pretending
to sew on finished quilts than women actually
sewing patchwork.


Part of the caption here: "The work was tedious, but Argaree and her sister enjoyed working on the project together." (Hey, reporters! Doing dishes is tedious, patchwork is not.)


I couldn't find a picture of the most egregious error in
depicting quiltmaking, which was a late-20th-century Northern Bath
Tissue advertisement where women were quilting
with knitting needles. Here the artist has bowed
to public pressure and put more accurate needles in
their hands. I see the knitting needles are now in the hair.


UPDATE: Alexandra sent a URL to this old ad, it may
be far-fetched but the quilters are holding the right kind
of needles. In the one we are discussing they held knitting
needles. (Blowing one's nose in the quilt! Bad form.)

William Morris: Working on a Best of Morris Line

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Mostly Morris by the Heritage Quilters of the McHenry County Historical
Society, 2014

The McHenry County Historical Society and Museum in Illinois  is selling tickets to win this quilt made from my William Morris reproduction collections for Moda. The Heritage Quilters have used Jeff Gutcheon's Card Trick pattern with a selection of blue-greens and wine-reds.

It looks like the border is this piece from the Morris Apprentice
line of a few years ago.
Click here to read more:
http://www.mchsonline.org/mostly-morris-quilt-button

The drawing is November 12, 2014.

Moda and I are working on a Best of Morris collection, which the sales reps are showing to the shops this month. We took my favorites and did a little recoloring.



See what's coming by clicking here:
http://storefront.unitednotions.com/storefrontCommerce/search.do?searchType=keyword&keyword=%22best+of+morris%22&emailAddress=

Another form of sneak peek is the Moda catalog, which you can view by turning the pages at this link:
http://issuu.com/modafabrics/docs/moda-piece-no-9?e=6151448/9176232

My Best of Morris collection begins on page 83.


(Just so you don't get indignant that your shop hasn't got these fabrics yet, remember this catalog features future lines. The catalog is for shop owners so you will have to wait to actually buy the beautiful fabrics.)

 While you wait, I thought I'd show you some more Morris projects I've found on the web. You still may be able to find the fabrics the clever stitchers used or you can wait for the Best of Morris, scheduled for February, 2015, delivery to shops.

Reia at My Patchwork home decided to try some
curved piecing with a pre-cut pack from the Morris Apprentice line.

She worked from the center out

improvising and photographing as she went on....

to finish a Morris medallion.

Read more at My Patchwork Home
http://mypatchworkhome.wordpress.com/2014/02/02/a-grown-up-quilt-for-a-grown-up-home/

Ann Marie at AMSewing pieced a Kansas Dugout
pattern from JellyRoll strips of A Morris Tapestry

See her method here:

http://amsewing.blogspot.com/2010/01/theres-more-than-one-way-to-piece-block.html




My old friend Judy Martin has included William Morris reproductions in the Sisters Log Cabin quilt patterned in her book Extraordinary Log Cabin Quilts. (We worked together at Quilters Newsletter when we were mere children.)


Sisters Log Cabin by Judy Martin, quilted by Lana Corcoran, 102" x 102"

Read more about Judy's book here:
http://www.judymartin.com/sneak-peek.cfm



It looks like she used the Morris Tapestry line too.

I'll be posting more about the Best of Morris.

American Quilt Study Group Meeting/Milwaukee

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The American Quilt Study Group held its 35th yearly seminar last week in Milwaukee. It's an annual highlight in the quilt historian's year. What's the best part?


  • Old friends
  • New friends
  • Scholarly papers
  • Antique Quilt Exhibits
  • Exhibit of reproduction Civil War Quilt Study quilts
  • Tours
  • Study Centers

  • Rod Kiracofe talking about quilts from
    the mid- to late-20th century from his new book:

    Unconventional and Unexpected
    American Quilts Below the Radar 1950-2000





    but


    • Shopping Ops has to be a top draw. 

    One can buy (or see) spectacular quilts from dealers who come from around the country. The onsite exhibits and sales are open only to registrants.

    We also have an auction room featuring donations from members. This sale benefits the organization.


    There's an enormous silent auction.

    we bid for a couple of days

    Notice finger in lower left. These are bi-i-i-ig yo-yos

    The donor auction has items for all tastes.

    from finished quilts....



    and tops

    to blocks


    and paper ephemera, books...you name it...

    More pictures to tempt you to consider 
    attending the 2015 seminar in Indianapolis, September 9-13.









    The 2014 Seminar was hosted by the Wisconsin Quilt Study Group and
    the Northern Illinois Quilt Study Group.

    Brochures for next fall's event will be mailed in early summer.
    Bookmark the American Quilt Study Group webpage:

    American Quilt Study Group Auction

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    Charm Quilt by Dawn Cook Ronningen

    Pieced from 342 reproduction prints

    In the last post I mentioned the silent auction at the
    annual AQSG seminar. We also do a live auction.


    Julie Silber is our auctioneer

    ably assisted by the Juliettes,
    dressed this year as Cheesettes 
    (Green Bay Packer fans.)

    Highlights of the donated auction items included
    Dawn's small hexagon quilt at the top of the page. Members make
    quilts for the auction and donate antiques from
    their collections.

    Sometimes members re-donate items
    they bought at previous auctions, such as Hazel
    Carter's mini, sold first in 1998




    The auction committee chooses the best of
    the donations for the live auction.

    Another highlight was this stuffed-work Lily quilt date-inscribed 1856.


    It was a little worn but quite a document


    donated by Kathy Metelica Cray of Grafton Village Quilts


    Bobbi Finley donated this North Carolina  Virginia top.


    Even if you don't attend the seminar you can
    donate items to benefit AQSG.

    Quilt related items are welcome too.
     I donated this watercolor I did last year.

    Richmond Reds: Emporia Original Print

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    Why Emporia??? Like the other prints in this line
    Emporia has a nice ring to the name. Emporia, Kansas,
    was about ten years old during the Civil War,
    founded by anti-slavery Northerners. We picked
    towns North and South for Richmond Reds.

    The document print for Emporia in my new 
    Richmond Reds reproduction collection of Moda

    The original star print was a hexagon in a very worn-out 
    comforter that was quite scrappy. I bought the ragged quilt because
    it had a hexagon of this Grant Campaign fabric
    from 1870.

    Although the Grant print was not nearly
    in this good a shape.

    The original tied comforter, which I took apart
    for the fabrics, looked something like this.

    I guessed most of the fabric was from about 1870 to 1890
    when those scrappy charm quilts were very popular.
    I added ten years either side to be safe on the date
     so dated this print as 1860-1900.

    The reproduction is available in three colorways
    You can see we toned down the bright white
    of the original at the top left above, so the new print wouldn't be quite so
    spotty. We also added a little more space between
    the stars so it would read more as texture or blender from
    a distance.

    Georgann Eglinski's been using the red colorway to make her
    Austen Family Album blocks.



    Exhibits: Antique Quilts /Fall & Winter 2014

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    Robert Doisneau, The Tabou, Paris, 1947

    Grab the gang and catch the fall quilt shows 
    featuring antique quilts.



    California, San Jose
    San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles. Antique Ohio Amish Quilts from the Darwin Bearley Collection, 40 bed, crib and doll quilts, illustrating the breadth of the Ohio Amish quilt making tradition between 1880 and 1940. November 15, 2014 – March 1, 2015.



    Colorado, Denver
    Denver Art Museum. First Glance - Second Look: Quilts from the Collection, through March 22, 2015.
    Catalog available for $10.95

    Colorado, Golden
    Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum. American Antiques from the Strouse Collection, Quilts from 1850 through 1935, through October 28, 2014.

    Connecticut, Danbury
    Danbury Museum & Historical Society. Quintessential Quilts: Piecing Together Danbury History. Through November 1.

    G.A.R. Fundraiser

    Illinois, Lockport
    Illinois State Museum Lockport Gallery. Civil War Quilters: Loyal Hearts of Illinois
    This show of quilts and other objects from the collection of the ISM, curated by Angela Goebel-Bain, Assistant Curator of Decorative Arts, comes down October 17, 2014.


    Massachusetts, Concord
    Concord Museum. Behind Closed Doors: Asleep in New England  includes bedding and quilts.
    Curated by Jane and Richard Nylander.
    October 10, 2014 - March 22, 2015


    Massachusetts, Lowell
    New England Quilt Museum:
    Down By the Old Mill Stream: Rhode Island Quilts, Through October 5.
    Humorous Quilts: Keeping Us In Stitches, October 9-December 31, 2014,
    http://nequiltmuseum.org/home.html

    Michigan, Adrian
    Lenawee County Historical Museum. Antique Quilt Exhibit, through December, 2014.


    Nebraska, Lincoln
    International Quilt Study Center and Quilt Museum:

    Design Dynamics of Log Cabins from the Holstein collection, through November 29, 2014.

    Modern Marvels: Quilts made from Kits, curated by Marin Hanson & Deborah Rake, features 20th century designers, companies, and publications well-known for their kits. Through February 28, 2015.


    Signature Cloths, guest-curated by Lynn Setterington, the exhibit "focuses on sewn signatures as visual ciphers and as a method of social engagement, with emphasis on the autographs of ordinary people." Through May 31, 2015.



    Vermont, Shelburne
    Shelburne Museum:
    All Star Quilts: The John Wilmerding Collection, 30 Star-Themed Quilts, through October 26, 2014.

    Seeking Beauty: Quilts by Nancy Crow, through October 31, 2014.


    Homefront & Battlefield: Quilts & Context in the Civil War, through January 1, 2015. This show from the American Textile History Museum will then travel to the Nebraska State Historical Society in Lincoln, opening February 1, 2015.



    Virginia, Christiansburg
    Montgomery Museum and Lewis Miller Regional Art Center. A Pieced History: Quilts of Montgomery County.  Twenty locally made historical quilts, through April, 2015.



    Virginia, Williamsburg
    Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum, A Celebration of Quilts "features dozens of quilts that represent the diversity of quilts made in America from the 18th through 20th centuries. Several of the quilts are new to the collection and have never before been seen by the public."
    Through June, 2016.

    Virginia, Winchester
    Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society. A Collection of Quilts (from the society's collection.) Through Oct 31, 2014.


    Wisconsin, Cedarburg
    Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts:  Mary McElwain Quilts & Ephemera, curated by Carol Butzke, through October 12, 2014.

    Jud and Luella Doss Vintage Wool Quilt Collection. October 15, 2014, - January 18, 2015



    Washington D.C.
    D.A.R. Museum. Eye on Elegance: Early Quilts of Maryland and Virginia
    October 3, 2014 – September 5, 2015.
    Curator of Costume and Textiles Alden O’Brien looks at quilts from Maryland and Virginia in an exhibit of 36 quilts with a focus on quilts from 1790 to 1860, design migrations and the many hands who made the quilts.
    http://www.dar.org/museum

    Richmond Reds: Springfield

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    Springfield is the largest print in my new
    Richmond Reds collection of repro prints.




    Springfield in Mahogany Red

    We found the document print in an antique sample
    book in the Moda collection. I liked the graceful
    tossed repeat and the detail in the original drawing

    Springfield in Rebel Red
    It has a very characteristic middle-of-the-19th-century
    look, mainly in the dark outline around lighter stems. The range
    of madder shades of creams, reds, tans and chocolate is also typical
    of the style.

    Bright Star
    Here Georgann Eglinski has used the Shirting
    Cream colorway for her first block in the
    Austen Family Album series (see the link to the free patterns in the
    left hand column.)

    Block 10--Good Fortune

    Bronze colorway

    Chocolate colorway

    Copperplate Colorway

    We've used the Rebel Red colorway for the
    border in the Richmond Red kit.

    The Lincoln house in Springfield, Illinois

    Why Springfield for the print name?
    It's Lincoln's hometown in Illinois


    but it's also one of the most popular town names in the U.S.,
    even if you don't count the Simpson's mythical Springfield.

    So if you don't feel good about using the Rebel Red colorway
    to remember Springfield, Illinois, consider the print named for 

    Springfield, Georgia
    or

    Springfield, Arkansas

    Cheddar Exhibit at American Quilt Study Group Seminar

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    AQSG's seminar always features quilt shows
    on the meeting premises and in local museums.
    Here's a glimpse of one of the onsite exhibits.

    Being in Wisconsin, home of the cheeseheads, 
    we were treated to a display of cheddar colored quilts.

    If you are confused---all you need to know
    is it has to do with football.



    The first few are from the collection of Seminar co-chair
    Carol Butzke of Wisconsin.


    Kathlyn Sullivan has collection of North Carolina
    quilts featuring the fabric.



    Can't recall which collector's this one is.


    Above and below, Carol's


    The last one is Kathy's.

    Textile specialists call the color Chrome Orange after the
    dye that created it, but everybody today calls it Cheddar.

    The Fan Fad Evolves

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    I was looking to make a case for a date on a fan quilt so
    I went through my file of date-inscribed quilts to help make
    that point that fancy fans were earlier than more utilitarian quilts.

    Collection of the San Jose Quilt Museum dated
    1883-4
    The earliest fan blocks I found were several in early crazy
    quilts dated 1882 and 1883. Some of these early crazy
    quilts had one fan, but this one has four in the corners.

    Signed 1884 Emily Sprague, Mattwan NY

    In the early 1880s the fan showed up as a repeat block, usually of silks and wools with the same kind of elaborate embroidery stitches and pictures seen on crazy quilts in the 1880s.

    1893
    The fancy embroidery continued into the 1890s.

    1893 Mount Carmel 
    Collection of the Smithsonian Institution



    1894

    1894 Ima Frank Richie, Virginia

    1896 Quilt Index North Carolina project
    Many of the late 19th-century examples in the file
    show variety and skill in the embroidery. The fabrics were elegant
    silk and wool scraps in show quilt style.

    1896 Duglas Acres
     Here's a signature quilt with many names, and little decorative embroidery

    The look is more austere but that
    ruffle indicates it is more for show than for warmth.

    1897
    In the late 1890s changes occur.
    One change is that the fans are often combined into
    circles or wheels. 
    1897

    Another is that the silks begin to vanish from the scrap bag,
    replaced by more everyday wools. This is probably explained
    by the changes in international trade in silk, making the scraps
     less available.

    1902

    R.B. 1903

    While embroidery continues, the trend is towards less variety...
    More of this feather stitch or briar stitch.
    Fewer unusual or complex stitches. 
    Pictorial embroidery becomes scarcer.

    1903 Columbia County Pennsylvania


    1905 or 1906

    Four fan blocks
    equal what we call a Dresden Plate or Wheel

    1905 Grandma


    1909 William


    1912 Lizzie Miller
    There is less skill in the embroidery as the new century passes.

    1912 Mother


    Here's the last one in the dated quilt file that looks to be show quilt style,
    nicely embroidered, although without much variety.

    And dated 1918



    Another big change in the 1890s was
    the switch from wool and silk to cotton.
    Red and white fans are often seen. Embroidery was rarely added to cotton.

    This sampler, dated 1893, is a style affected by the coming of the commercial pattern purchased
    through the mail.


    I had no fan or wheel quilts dated in the 1920s, which could mean that people were less likely to sign and date their quilts in the 1920s or that the fan fad had played out.

    In the 1930s  we see a new style.

    Each of these three in the pastel cotton scrap look is
    dated 1930



    New look, new fad.
    Style changes that are useful in dating fan quilts
    Here we have one with the numerals "81" in a corner.

    Someone thought this meant 1881 but the quilt looks nothing like
    the other fans or wheels from the 19th century.

    It's probably 1930-1950, when the new-fashioned fans were so popular. That 81 embroidered in white could be the maker's age,or she might have kept count of the quilts she made.
    It does not mean 1881 or 1981. The style just doesn't fit those dates.

    DAR Museum: Eye on Elegance Quilt Exhibit

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    Detail of Applique Flower Basket Quilt 
    by Anna Catharine Hummel Markey Garnhart, 
    date-inscribed 1849

    For those who are fascinated by early quilts, the show of the year is now open at the Museum of the Daughters of the American Revolution in Washington D.C.

    Eye on Elegance: Early Quilts of Maryland and Virginia opened October 3rd and will be on view through September 5, 2015.


    Mathematical Star by Amelia Heiskell Lauck 
    and/or Eliza Jane Sowers Lauck 

    Alden O’Brien, Curator of Costume and Textiles, looks at quilts from Maryland and Virginia with a focus on quilts from 1790 to 1860. She found room in the gallery for 36 spectacular examples. 


    Over the past few years Alden and a team of volunteers have done a good deal of research on these elegant quilts, building on the work of past curators such as Gloria Seaman Allen and Nancy Gibson.



    Because it is the D.A.R., the museum emphasizes genealogy research, so the information about the makers goes far beyond the typical museum label.




    Go to the online exhibition to get a glimpse of how great this exhibit is.
    http://eyeonelegance.dar.org/


    You'll start planning your trip to the nation's capital right away. 


    The DAR Museum is across the street from the White House, quite an impressive neighborhood.



    Read a guest post by Alden on her research on this blog last year:
    http://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2013/08/anna-catharine-garnhart-by-alden-obrien.html



    Alden and I have been interested in an important detail of the attribution of the quilt...The "and/or" part of the label. 

    Applique Flower Basket Quilt 
    by Anna Catharine Hummel Markey Garnhart, 
    date-inscribed 1849

    Read some of my thoughts about the work of A.C.H.M. Garnhart at this post:
    http://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2013/04/elizabeth-welchs-eagle-quilt.html

    And see videos in the online exhibit:
    http://eyeonelegance.dar.org/exhibition/applique-quilts

    Here's a link to a list of YouTube videos from the DAR
    https://www.google.com/#q=dar+museum+youtube

    Richmond Reds: Bloomington

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    Document print for the Bloomington
    fabric in my Richmond Reds collection
    for Moda

    The original print here was a shirting print done in two shades of red on white, a very common
    19th-century style found in clothing and quilts.

    If you compare the original to the reproduction
    you will notice several differences. We toned
    down the shades so this small print would
    fit in with the larger prints in the line. We call this
    colorway "Aged."

    We also changed the figure's set. The original was
    a directional print. The leaves all went one way.

    This directionality is not often desirable in patchwork
    or clothing construction. For a garment one has to 
    "buy extra fabric," as the patterns always warn. 



    Fabric has to be wasted if the prints have to go one way as in the stripe above. In a quilt one has to plan for the directionality. Non-directional prints are generally more useful.



    Why Bloomington?
    Another pretty name. Here's Bloomington, Indiana
    in the mid-19th-century.


    Denniele Bohannon has used the Rebel Red
    colorway for the background of this experiment
    in 3-dimensionality. She's also used the other two
    colorways as mediums and lights.

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