Quilt Collections at Flowerpatch

So many quilts to see at Flowerpatch Quilters March meeting when Sue M and Jo C brought along their collections of antique quilts for a fascinating show and tell. 

They told us about a resurgence in patchwork in the 1930's which means that there are quite a lot of quilts of this era to tempt the collector .... and they are definitely tempted!! Quite a few of their quilts had other older quilts inside as wadding and it was lovely to think of quilts being so used that they start to disintegrate and yet still have value to the quilter. Although many of the quilts were from this time, Sue and Jo also had much older quilts from the 1860's or thereabouts.

I'm a real fan of log cabin quilts and these two used tiny strips of fabric less than 1" wide. I had thought that the first one was courthouse steps pattern but it is simply the placement of the fabric that makes it appear that way. The second is more like the log cabin we see done today.

These two are made by the English Paper Piecing method, the diamonds having been made locally in Cornwall. One quilt top still had it's papers and this is a really exciting find.

I couldn't quite believe that one of the old quilts had a border of "cheater fabric" having always thought that this was a recent phenomenon. 

Sometimes the backs of quilts were pre-printed with crosshatching ready for the quilting and the quilting stitches would even cross the applique on the front. Close quilting was often necessary to keep the wadding in place as it had a tendency to migrate.

These are 3 applique quilts. The stitches on the centre quilt are tiny, tiny and the quilt design is exquisite.

Sue and Jo brought along many more quilts and also beautiful and precious sewing items for us to see.

Thank you to both Sue and Jo for an enthralling, enjoyable evening.

Our Flowerpatch charity quilt is proceeding well and the hand quilting is partly done. When completed I will show you the whole thing - this is just another taster!

The centre fruit wreath is cross-hatched, with arcs surrounding on the leafy fabric; each leaf and bud of the garland border is quilted around; and curved lines are quilted on the half square triangles border.

Another project that we have embarked upon is small (approx 6" x 8") pictures of our town of Launceston and this is yet another taster with the reveal to come in a later post.

Apologies that today's post has been ALL bits of quilts, but I hope that your appetite is whetted for a future visit.

At our next Flowerpatch Quilter's meeting on 13th April 2017 we will be stitching and flipping to make the sides of a zipper pouch, and learning how to put it all together. Please bring along lots of small scraps of fabric and your sewing kit.

Anita xx