Fabric Choices for Quilt Repair

Just in case anyone is curious, here are photos of the individual fabrics that I auditioned for repairing the Lone Star quilt I recently wrote about.

Two greens:

Four tans:

Here are all six.  They are in the same order left to right as the photos above.  Which would you have chosen?

Lovely Laces and Buttons

Here's a lovely little chiffon blouse from the Basya Berkman Vintage collection.  The only mending help it needed from me was re-attaching loose snaps.  I'm sharing it here because the laces and buttons are so delightful.

The buttons, which are decorative only, are sweet little crocheted covers over solid bases. (The front placket snaps closed.)

 

Glowing Lone Star Quilt

Here's a quilt that's definitely "one to write home about", or in this case, ha-ha, one to write a blog post about.

This 1930s beauty was sent to me for repairs.  The ring of green diamonds was pretty much totally in shreds, and the ring of tan diamonds was not far behind.  In the end, the owner and I decided to have me replace all the greens and just the tans that were in the worst shape.

That decision hinged on finding fabrics that blended well with the originals.  I ordered swatches from my favorite on-line source, Reproduction Fabrics, and took photos to compare them and pick the best match.

Cozy Log Cabin and Woven Gingham

This cozy log cabin / straight furrow quilt dates to around the 1920s or early 1930s.

That first photo isn't cropped badly.  This quilt actually has just one border.  And that one border was a pretty bold color choice, given the main colors used in the blocks.  The red border fabric was the only one that had started to give out, along with the gingham binding which was the back fabric brought around front.  I used a red reproduction print replacement, and also re-bound the edge with a vintage woven gingham.

Little Cat Quilt

A repair customer brought me some of her other quilts to look at, just for fun.  Here's one of them.

I like it because I like cats.  I also like it because it's signed and dated - 1997 - another quilt that can help document and date fabric colors and styles.  I'm quite fond of finding these and adding them to the online "data base".

Two Quilts

I spent last week visiting the Seattle area.  What a lovely part of the world! 

To make the experience even more fun, there were two quilts with some great conversation prints at my friend's house.  Both are signed and dated.

This quilt is called "Gypsy Wife Bicycling" made by Durlyn Finnie of Seattle in 2015.  The combination of patchwork blocks and strips and bright colors make for quite a cheery quilt.  I got to sleep with this one!

Durlyn collected absolute gobs of fabrics with cyclists and bicycles of all sorts and colors.

Sailing Ships

I repaired a very, very worn basket quilt made in the 1880s or 90s.  It was so tattered that all I could do was put on a new back and stitch what was left to the new backing for support. 

The background and alternate blocks fabric was wonderful.  It's a conversation print with detailed masted sailing ships and anchors.  The designs are about 3/4" tall.  Here's one of the alternate blocks that was still intact.

Such a fun fabric!  I'm getting more and more into collecting conversation prints.