QUILTS & FABRIC: PAST & PRESENT


Sunday, October 29, 2017

Antique Quilt Heaven at AQSG

Four block eagle quilt (1840-1870) on the left
at Julie Silber Quilts booth

One good reason to attend the American Quilt Study Group Seminar, no matter where it is, is the Quilt Dealers Area. The best dealers in antique quilts from all over the U.S. show their stuff.

Kathy Metallica Cray and Julie Silber.
Julie's from Berkeley, California

A very interesting coxcomb and birds quilt (1840-1890)
that went in the first half hour.

  
Legacy Quilts, Xenia Cord from Indiana

Gerald Roy of Pilgrim & Roy from Vermont
with the famous Ninety and Nine Quilt from the 1930s behind him.

An 1848 New Jersey quilt from his booth

Julia Kelly Hodenius from Atlanta featured
a unique Georgia quilt with tombstones among the circles.
Is that a Portuguese blue stripe on the table? I didn't even notice it
till I posted the photo.

Here's a pile o' toile from her Pique Trouver shop

Nancy Hahn from Country Things brought her Portuguese stripe.

Jane Lury from Labors of Love

Jane  & David had lots of cut-out chintz

Stella Rubin from Maryland on the right

Cindy Rennels on the right from Oklahoma
with a couple of Southern beauties below.

A Carolina sundew top from 1870-1900

Whig's Defeat with a chintz border
(1840-1870)

There were hundreds of quilts to see...

And then in a flash they were gone.


Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Virtual Booth-Quilt Market Houston: Saving Money



Quilt Market is October 26-30, 2017 in Houston. We decided to save some of our virtual money this year and not do a virtual booth. We're just going to go and dress to sell....

Inspired by these photos from about 1880-1910
of women who were human advertisements.

Selling silverware

Dressmaker with a large scissors

Dressmaker with spools, fashion plates and scissors

I encountered some problems with the Sunflower Pattern Co-Operative members agreeing to parade around like this.
The word dignity came up.

So I hired a couple of virtual signboards from the 1860s---nice wide skirts.


In case all those ruffles get in the way of our message- here's the address
for our Etsy Shop:

Of course this is just an excuse to show you all the photos of signboard
women I've found.

Advertising starching perhaps?




Photographer

Bakery

So have fun at Market. I just got back from the American Quilt Study Group Seminar in Manchester and I will be napping.

Sunday, October 22, 2017

Geography Lesson


Did you ever notice how much a crazy quilt can resemble a map?

Clara apparently did.

1891.Crazy quilt by 13-year-old Clara Sawtell, done as a class project,
Wisconsin Project, pictured in their book
Wisconsin Quilts: Stories in the Stitches by Ellen Kort.

"British America" it says above the Canadian border.
From Copake Auctions & Laura Fisher.
http://www.laurafisherquilts.com/shop/Quilts/SPECIALTY-QUILTS/Silk-Velvet-Quilts/p/MAP-of-the-UNITED-STATES-AND-CANADA-ANTIQUE-QUILT-sku-10574.htm

American Museum of Folk Art collection---with our major waterways.

Another from Laura Fisher's inventory---20th century---with
our minor waterways too.

State Flowers. Yikes!

The New York Public Library's excellent image files
have this picture, probably from about 1940.
A very accurate representation.

I like the inaccurate representations better.

Things got tougher after 1959. What are you
going to do with Hawaii?

I've got several state maps in the file.

Some states are easier to represent than others

Harriett Deuell, Wyandotte County, Kansas, Dated 1887.

This is a map of Kansas, not Nebraska.
Nebraska is on our North. Indian Territory
is now Oklahoma.

An even more formidable project is representing the whole world---
or at least the Russo-centric part of it.

One of those category 6 hurricanes seems to have played
havoc with the gulf states here.

Clinton R. Hamilton, Washington DC, Dated 1934
IQSCM #2008_008_0001
The best one!

See a Pinterest page on contemporary map quilts and aerial views:
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/527765650052656839/?lp=true

See a preview of the Wisconsin book here with Clara's story:
https://books.google.com/books?id=2vko5D1zymYC&pg=PA101&dq=map+quilt+united+states&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi2s4eFs6fWAhWY0YMKHXcZDqIQ6AEIRjAF#v=onepage&q=map%20quilt%20united%20states&f=false

Thursday, October 19, 2017

Past Perfect: Margaret Mew

Sarah Jane's Scrapbag by Margaret Mew.
October's Past Perfect nominee is Margaret Mew from Elphinston, Victoria, Australia.


Margaret Mew's home is an 1860s railroad station, the
reason for her business name Quilt Station.
Some quotes from her webpage: 
"Designing and making new quilts inspired by antique quilts, that’s what I love to do. Some are fast and some are slow. . . very, very slow. I don’t mind how long they take me to make. The quiet time spent planning, drawing and then stitching is my reason for starting. The journey is just as rewarding as the destination."
Banyan Tree by Margaret Mews

Her reproduction quilts began with inspiration from quilts from the British Isles.

Banyan Tree was inspired by a quilt from about 1815.



But in recent years has turned her attention to Quilts from the Colonies,
those in North America.


Featured in her 2016 book Quilts from the Colonies available from
Quilt Mania.

Henrietta & Friends
She sells templates for some of these designs.

Here's a recent project from her Instagram page

Inspired by a quilt from her collection dated 1849 with initials 
J.O. from Canonsburg. Pennsylvania.

She does her own machine quilting on a long arm machine
named Violet.

Helen Hays quilted this one.

Her sense of composition and craftsmanship are admirable but
my favorite Mew talent is her use of fabrics.
What a stash.
And she knows how to use it.



Providence

She does daring things and she teaches others how
to capture that antique feel with an update.

See more at her webpage:

Her Instagram page:

And order her book here: