Why Restore and Conserve Old Quilts?

read the story of this quilt

Why do I like repairing quilts?  My academic background is in anthropology, which taught me about how much meaning the objects we make and use every day can hold.  And all quilts have their story.

"Storytelling is the place where social and personal history meet."

This is a line from a lovely book I recently received, How to Write Your Personal or Family History, by Katie Funk Wiebe.  The book was written by the mother of a dear friend of mine.  She wrote many books, many of them about family and history.

One thing she stresses is how small memories and facts can build a valuable memoir.  I feel the same is true of quilts - it's not only the flashy and museum quality quilts that are worth gentle handling and care.

Courthouse Steps

Lately, I have been reaping the benefit of getting to the age of downsizing.  And the benefit has been adopting quilts from many directions.

Not that I really have room or reason to have them myself either, except for being able to write about them here and share them when I teach.  That's good enough, I figure.  But really, the main reason I say yes and bring them in is that I love them and want to give them a home.

I am reminded of my brother- and sister-in-law who kept the garage door open a crack and a bowl of cat food inside until they had a population of 3 dogs and 9 cats.  The 9th cat in the series was named E. Nuff Already.  Yup.

Anyway, a friend offered me this lovely silk Courthouse Steps.  She'd had it hanging on her wall for many years, and now the silks are doing that late 19th century silk "thing" of shattering and crumbling.  So before I show you the detail photos, take a moment to appreciate it from a distance, in all its glory.......

A Blast from the Past

The other day, I met up with a quilt I'd made over 30 years ago and forgotten!

I got a text from one of the people who grew up a few houses away from me.  She's been doing lots of sorting and clearing out over these last couple of months.  In amongst her son's childhood items, she found this quilt, and asked if I had made it.  At first, I didn't remember having made a baby quilt for her.  But when I scrolled down further to see the photos, I recognized it immediately.

Wow.  Hee, hee.

I made it in 1986, about 7 years after I learned to quilt.  It was a pretty popular pattern at the time.  A Google search came up with Garden Trellis, Garden Twist, and Around the Twist.  Around the Twist sounds very familiar, so I think that was the name as I learned (and forgot) it. 

And yes, at that time, I signed all my quilts and crafty items with those little name tapes.  The name was suggested by one of my friends, a pun if you will.  "Handmade" becomes "Ann Made" - see?  I ran out of "Ann Made" business cards a long, long time ago, but I still have some of that tape tucked away in a drawer, and I still have scraps of some of those fabrics in my stash. 

It's this kind of color play and geometry play that are a big part of what intrigued me about quiltmaking - and has kept me going all these years.   I still love green and I still love little spriggy prints the best, like the background white print.   So, it was a very pleasant walk down Memory Lane.  And I'm posting about a crib quilt just under the wire, as it's still just barely Mother's Day here. 

Quilt Restoration Workshop Announcement

Sadly, Martha Spark and I are canceling our Quilt Restoration Workshop which was to be held this July 23-25, 2020. We have potential plans to offer the workshop again August 19-21, 2021.

Please keep in touch here and via our other social media sites for new information.  In the interim, we’ll be working on new content to share with you and to stay connected through our shared quilt restoration tales.

Brilliant Stars

Wow.  This quilt is just wow.  It's one of the wow-iest quilts I've worked on.  I love it.

Here's how the owner came to acquire it:

I don’t collect quilts or even know how to use a sewing machine. I just really liked the quilt colors and patterns.....when I saw it in an antique mall in Columbia, MO (I honestly love Orange as a color). So much so, that after leaving without it I regretted it. The following Monday I was back at work and just called them on a whim and made them an offer and they agreed to ship it to me. 

Well, what a fun story!  I love that the quilt kept calling to him from half way across the country and waited for him to call the dealer!

Texas Star with a Surprise

In some ways, this cheery quilt is a typical 1930s-40s quilt.  But not all ways.  Read on....

The quilt has a favorite look of this era, a huge collection of multi-colored print scraps on a white ground.

It's a bit different in that it's not one of what I see as the top 3 scrap quilt patterns from this era - Grandmother's Flower Garden, Double Wedding Ring, or Dresden Plate.  Texas Star is not rare, but still not one of the top three.

What really makes it a one-of-a-kind, at least in my experience, is the quilting.

When an Old Quilt Needs a New Home

The quilts in my collection are not pristine museum quality quilts by any stretch of the imagination.  Sometimes I've bought quilts that are not, well, very sturdy anymore.  (For example, the stars quilt that I have been gradually replicating.)  And sometimes lovely people give me very, uh, well-loved quilts.

Here's my most recent such acquisition, given to me at a recent quilt study group meeting.  It had been found at a sale at closing time, in the discard pile because no one had wanted it.  One of the quilt study members had rescued it, and when she spread it out to show everyone, my first thought was that I really, really wanted it but didn't want to jump up and down and blurt out "I want that quilt!  Can I have it pleeeease?!  Me, me, me!!!!"  And then, much to my surprise, I was hearing her say that she really couldn't take anything new into her house and did anyone want it!  Well, yes!