QUILTS & FABRIC: PAST & PRESENT


Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Quilts from the 1960s


I was making quilts in the 1960s. Someday I'll have to post them. HAH!

1961 Bowtie



 But I do have a few date-inscribed quilts made by others from that decade in my file of dated quilts. Just enough to entertain you.

The classic Mountain Mist Sunflower, 1961,

done in a machine zig-zag applique.

1961, sort of a bowtie


Dated with a felt tip pen.


1962, Sunbonnet Sue

1964, Crazy





1964 Bowtie



1964, String Friendship


1965

1966 from the North Carolina Project and the Quilt Index,
Shadow Trail, a Mountain Mist pattern

1967 from the Vermont Project and the Quilt Index,
Doulbe Irish Cross, a Ruby McKim design

1967, Crazy


1968, Rectangles Hit or Miss




1968, Four Patch



What design ideas were popular?
  • Bowties.
  • Alternate plain, bright-colored blocks.
  • Commercial patterns
  • And people were still making crazy quilts.

Saturday, May 28, 2016

Morris Hexathon 4: Box Hill

Morris Hexathon Block 4: Box Hill by Becky Brown

This week's block is a variation on the classic box design,
what we might call Baby's Blocks.

Collection of the Brooklyn Museum, 1880-1900
The design is another one of the hexagonal blocks that we see in 19th-century quilts...

Perhaps influenced by Italian mosaics such as this floor at Pompeii.
The geometry is ancient.

We actually see a simple version of the design as cheater cloth---
 printed patchwork---from about 1840 or earlier,

The block in a late-19th-century silk quilt from the 
Massachusetts project and the Quilt Index

 Box Hill by Bettina Havig
The pattern fits a hexagonal block. It's just one piece---but 27 of them.


I named it for Box Hill in the Surrey hills, a feature in the English landscape that was a venerable tourist attraction when George Lambert painted it in 1733. Jane Austen's fictional Emma's visited and so did William Morris.

The View from Box Hill.
Emma and friends picnicking in a BBC production.

Morris loved exploring the countryside. He wrote a letter to daughter Jenny in June, 1886, after a visit to Box Hill with her sister May. "The place Box Hill is really beautiful with a famous box wood at the top. You and I must go there when you are back in London."

Below the pattern for English Paper-Piecing.


Pattern for an 8" Hexagon
(4" sides)

To Print:
  • Create a word file or a new empty JPG file that is 8-1/2" x 11". 
  • Click on the image above. 
  • Right click on it and save it to your file. 
  • Print that file out 8-1/2" x 11". The hexagon sides should finish to 4" across. 
  • Adjust the printed page size if necessary. 
  • Add seams when you cut the fabric.


I found two published names for BlockBase #240:
  • Tea Box from the Farm Journal
  • Diamond Cube from the Ladies Art Company
Below a drawing from the LAC catalog, which is a little vague--- missing a few lines.

Diamond Cube

An example made by Mary Gentry about 1910 from the Tennessee Project
and the Quilt Index. The Ladies Art Company may have been her source.

Here's another version from about 1900-1910.

It's hard to see how this one's constructed


An option--- BlockBase #240

Exactly the same pieced design but shaded and set differently

From Julie Silber's collection.

It's all the same pattern, rotated and shaded to different effect.

One More Inspiration

Just to confuse you.
This one's not #240.


An Alternate
I designed this series to be pieced over paper. Another option is to piece this simplified version conventionally. Or save it for later. As the hexies get more difficult you might want an easy block on file.

It's a 60 degree diamond with a 4" finished side.