Janet Bolton

In surfing through some blogs the other day I came across this post at Needleprint blog announcing a Janet Bolton workshop at the Quilt Museum in York, England on June 11th. Too bad! It's sold out.
http://needleprint.blogspot.com/2010/03/janet-bolton-workshop-11-june-2010.html

Janet Bolton is an English textile artist who has a direct style of applique,

 a unique balance of sentiment and minimalism.

She's written and illustrated several books, some of which are hard to find, but there seems to be a re-issue of her Patchwork Folk Art book.

More on Janet Bolton. You'll enjoy looking at the pictures.

http://www.janetbolton.com/

http://de-la-course-des-nuages.blogspot.com/2009/09/janet-bolton.html

http://www.godfreyandwatt.co.uk/previousexhibitions.asp?id=49  

 

My Spring Fabric

I don't have a spring line of fabric.


This is because the spring line I've been working on looked so autumn-like that we at Moda decided it should come out in July or August, when it will be my fall line of fabric.

It's called Arnold's Attic

It has prints and wovens in blues, greens, oranges and browns.

(Dachshund for scale)

Roseanne Smith is making a Mariner's Compass out of the preview yardage

She's been working on color decisions.

We are crazy about the large leaf print.

Here's her final decision on color.

It's called Arnold's Attic because all the document prints (the originals) were gifts from my friend Arnold Savage. He has quite a stash of antique fabrics. These are all from the late 19th-century.

More about Arnold and more about Arnold's Attic later.

Piecing the Past

Prairie Dunes

Designed by Lynne Hagmeier,

 Pieced by Lois Sprecker, Quilted by Cheri Schaeffer

50 x 72"

Lynne Hagmeier of Kansas Troubles has a new book from Star Quilt Books.

Piecing the Past: Vintage Quilts Recreated by Kansas Troubles

should be in the quilt shops any day.

Here's a sneak peek at some of her reproduction quilts.

 She's interpreted antique quilts in her Moda fabrics from the Kansas Troubles collections.

Stars Over the Plains

Her inspirations were quilts from the turn of the last century, which she's updated in her signature colors.

South 40

83" x 83"

This one is a version of the split 9-patch,

known in Pennsylvania as the Perikiomen Valley pattern.

Click here to learn more about the book:

https://www.pickledishstore.com/productDetail.php?PID=1174

And read more about her Kansas Troubles fabric by clicking here:

http://www.unitednotions.com/un_main.nsf/kansas-troubles-fabrics!OpenPage 

World's Biggest Hexagon Quilt

Gail Chalker of Gatton in Queensland, Australia, has organized the World's Biggest Hexagon quilt which was on display a few weeks ago in Brisbane.

She sent a link to information:
http://worldsbiggesthexagonquilt.blogspot.com/

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art2273.asp

http://hexagonquilt-along2.blogspot.com/

It will be displayed at the Gatton Quilt Show from May 11-16, 2010.

One section in progress

When I was a contributing editor at Quilters Newsletter years ago I kept track of quilt records like the largest and smallest and most pieces etc. I'll have to rummage through those files and post some information on the record setters some day.

Gail's going for the Guinness Book of World's Records.

Now some will say that the AIDS quilt is the world's biggest quilt--- do remember this is the World's Largest Hexagon Quilt.

AIDS Quilt in Washington in 1987

And also remember that the AIDS quilt is not a stitched-together, single quilted quilt. It is the World's Largest Public Art Project. If all the sections were laid end to end today it would cover six blocks.

Winterthur Quilts in Milwaukee

One of the earliest examples of the reel pattern by the Schleifer family

Everybody's packing to go to England but don't forget the spectacular show of early quilts that will be opening at the Milwaukee Art Museum on May 22nd. American Quilts: Selections from the Winterthur Collection debuted at the Winterthur Museum in Delaware a few years ago and this will be the last stop in the exhibit's travels.

A hand printed fragment cut from a counterpane

About 1800

I recall it as one of the best quilt shows I ever saw, as it has so many examples of early textiles. I nearly jumped up and down with my friend Julie Powell, an authority on political textiles, when we saw a bed covered with the toile called The Apotheosis of Benjamin Franklin.

The Apotheosis of Benjamin Franklin toile, about 1790

Quilting in a Quaker strip quilt

There were quilts of hand printed American cottons including some by John Hewson, early silk Quaker quilts, great chintzes and signature quilts.

Cotton quilt by Quaker Rebecca Scattergood Savery

Early 19th-century

I don't think this venue in Milwaukee will have the complete show we saw at Winterthur but the press release says there will be over 40 quilts.

Wholecloth quilt of an 18th-century palampore

If you are interested in early quilts---before 1850--- and want to see some of the best surviving examples you must book a trip to Milwaukee before the show closes on September 6th.

Julie and Carmel examining a Hewson spread

Linda Eaton's comprehensive catalog, Quilts in a Material World,  is available from several online sources.

And while you are in Milwaukee try some frozen custard.

They are more famous for that locally than for their beer.

Persian Pickles and Shawl Prints

Quilt block with a paisley print on the right,

about 1875

Ask a quilter today to give you a name for a paisley print and she might tell you it’s a Persian Pickle, a name with a supposedly long etymology— but it’s all fiction. The earliest source I found for the name is Sandra Dallas’s 1995 novel The Persian Pickle Club about a quilting group in Kansas during the Great Depression. They took their name from a bolt of paisley fabric.

I did a digital search for the words "Persian Pickle" in the Google books database of print material from the 19th century and found nothing with those two words linked together. Doing a search for references after 1900 found lots of hits but they all had to do with Dallas’s book, which is quite popular.

Here's the only 19th-century reference with the words Persian and Pickle close-by. It's from an 1874 play, called Mont Blanc: A Comedy in Three Acts by Eugène Labiche and Henry Mayhew. The reference seems to have to do with a brand of pickles and how to advertise it.

CHIRPEY," said I to myself when the brilliant idea first flashed upon me, " you're the proud inventor of a delicious new condiment—christened—after a long series of sleepless nights—' THE SHAH'S DELIGHT, or, Persian Persuasive Pickle.' But," said I, " nothing's done now-a-days, Chirpey, without advertising and puffing… Chirpey ! you be off at once and put up a poster of your delicious ' Persuasive Pickles' on the summit of Mont Blanc so that the eyes of Europe may be upon it."…. (he lets the end of the roller drop down over the chair~back, so as to expose to the audience a large coloured placard, representing the SHAH OF PERSIA seated cross-legged devouring pickles, and with the words " THE SHAH'S DELIGHT " printed in large letters underneath it.

That’s the thing about engaging fiction, like The Persian Pickle Club—
it can make you believe it’s all very real.

Wool paisley shawl, machine woven between 1860-1890

Woman in Paisley shawl about 1875

What might a 19th-century quiltmaker call a design in the tear-shaped paisley cone? The manufacturers referred to them as Cashmere prints or shawl prints, after the Cashmere shawls made in India. These hand-woven Kashmiri shawls were reproduced on mecahnical looms in Scotland, particularly in the town of Paisley, which gave its name to the design.

The scrap of fabric above is the document print for the reproduction paisley in my Moda collection called Civil War Homefront. Those little wiggly lines around the "paisley" are supposed to imitate a woven design in a printed cotton. Shawl prints were all the rage about 1860-1890.

Civil War Homefront Quilts

I teach at Prairie Point Quilts in Shawnee, Kansas. When I was in the other day I saw two quilts they've made from my Civil War Homefront collection for Moda.

Pat Moore is teaching Scrap Happy Quilters, trading the 5" squares suggested in More Nickel Quilts by Pat Spaeth.

They are also working on a kit for this pattern. The fabric may be reproduction prints and colors but the quilts can be contemporary.

Check out their clubs by clicking here:

http://www.prairiepoint.com/clubs.html#scrap

And Linda Frost sent a photo of a quilt she made from some precuts from the collection-very contemporary.

Linda Frost, Circle of Geese

Michelle Yeo's Reproduction Quilts

Indiana Rising Sun by Michelle Yeo

Michele from Texas introduced me to the work of another Michelle from Australia---Michelle Yeo.

Abbeville County by Michelle Yeo

You can see she is making fabulous reproductions of antique American quilts with an emphasis on tricky piecing.

California Star by Michelle Yeo

Michelle sells patterns for these quilts and many others, plus templates for some.

Wild Goose Chase by Michelle Yeo

Click here to see her catalog of patterns and templates at Michelle Yeo Quilt Designs:
http://michelleyeoquiltdesigns.com/html/s02_article/default.asp?keyword=Quilt-Designs-1

All the quilt pictures are (c) 2009 Michelle Yeo.

April---End of the Silly Year

You may have my 2009-April 2010 calendar for Star Books called The Lost Quilt Masterpieces. This month marks the end---with the April altered masterpiece being a version of the Mona Lisa called Leonardo's Last Invention.

You can still buy a set of a dozen notecards in six different designs including the Dogs' Quilting Bee above.
Click here to read more about The 'Lost Quilt Masterpieces' Notecards:
https://www.pickledishstore.com/productDetail.php?PID=1083

People are asking if I'll do another calendar. I imagine I'll think of something else silly soon but there are no plans for a 2011 calendar yet.

So now what are we going to do for a calendar for the rest of 2010? Good quilt calendars are hard to find.

My advice---courtesy of my friend Deb Rowden. Buy a discounted 2010 calendar about kittens or antique cars. Cut up a magazine or an old calendar and paste a favorite quilt picture over each month. Voila! A custom quilt calendar for May to December.

Here's an unpublished left-over from the last project. It's based on Salvador Dali's The Persistence of Memory. It's called The Persistance of Unfinished Projects.

A Second Helping

Wild Gooseberry Pie by Edie McGinnis

Edie has a new book---in your quilt shops in a week or two---called A Second Helping of Desserts: More Sweet Quilts Using Precut Fabrics.

It's a follow-up to a book she did last year featuring projects stitched from precuts such as Moda's Jelly Rolls, Turnovers and Layer Cakes. Because Moda's named the squares, triangles and strips for pastries and desserts Edie has a sweet theme going here.

Wild Gooseberry Pie uses the Morris Workshop collection I did for Moda last year with the triangular turnovers pieced into flying geese.

Click here to read more about A Second Helping and see some sample pages.

https://www.pickledishstore.com/productDetail.php?PID=1175