USA 2013 - part 4

 Red and Green Exhibit at the Quilter's Hall of Fame

I love anything applique especially Red and Green Quilts and this was a great exhibit displaying the genre. The majority of quilts are from around Indiana - enjoy!

Whig Rose or Rose Bud Wreath
1840 - 1860
Made by Mary Jane Porter, Harrison County

Closeup of Whig Rose or Rose Bud Wreath

Whig Rose - 1845 - 1865
Made by Lavinia Rudicil Rubottom of Franklin County
Lavinia's only child died at age two, and she is said to have pieced quilts at night by lamp and candle-light whilst waiting for her husband William to return home from evening work. His will left a bequest "to her use and benefit... so long as she continues my widow and no longer". Lavinia never re-married.

Close up of Whig Rose
The Turkey Red fabric is "shattering" because of the caustic dye process used

Closeup of Whig Rose Border
The quilt is densely quilted and has a stuffed scalloped border

Whig Rose - 1910 - 1935
Maker Unknown
The mint green and pink fabric used in this quilt is a 20th century interpretation of the red and green palette of the 19th century

Appliqued Signature Album Quilt 1855 - 1869
Made by Katherine Newly Hodson of Arno, Hendricks County
Each block of this quilt is stamped with a name and town. Mrs. Hodson, possibly a Quaker, made it for her daughter Catherine Carter of Plainfield. The vine border is appliqued with a sewing machine, which was a new and costly invention and was shown off with pride

Close-up

Close-up of a very unusual block!

Close-up

Bleeding Heart 1850 - 1860
Made by Susannah Whitinger of Zionsville, Boone County

Coxcomb or Olive Branch 1850's
Unknown maker, from Parker or Vigo County
Note that the border has only three sides suggesting that the bed was pushed against the wall

Currants and Coxcombs 1821
Made by Amelia Lemon, Clarke County
Amelia finished her quilt at age 15. Three years later she married Eliphalet Pearson, with whom she had
12 children!

Pot of Roses 1854 - 1880's
Made by Elizabeth Ann Shipman Powell from Dugger, Sullivan County
Made up of four large blocks, the swag border hangs in the opposite direction than usual i.e. they are facing in rather than out. The top was most probably made during the 1850's, but it was not quilted until the 1880's.

Pot of Roses 1840 - 1860Maker and place unknown
An unusual pattern of moss roses, so named because of the distinctive points on their green calyxes

Close-up of Pot of Roses

The Freelandville Masonic Quilt - 1849
Made by Sarah Culbertson Freeville, Freelandville, Knox County
Masonic Emblems drawn by Dr. J. I. Freeland, Sarah's husband appear amongst floral bouquets.
While saving a quilt's origins is vital, it is strongly recommended that information is added to a label which is then stitched to the back of the quilt, rather than written directly onto the surface (see bottom left corner!)

Close-up of centre block

Close-up of Freelandville Masonic Quilt block
note the beehive and bees signifying industriousness

Close-up

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Old Soldier's Rose 1976
Made by Jean Funderburgh, San Jose, California

An original design - 1875 - 1890
Made by Samantha V. Arnett Davisson, of Jackson Township, Tippecanoe County
Samantha and her husband William had 9 children. They raised shorthorn cattle and Shropshire sheep. William held several county and township positions including commissioner, assessor and road supervisor.

Close-up of the block design

Unnamed pattern - 1858
Made by P.F. Martin from Clarksburg, Decatur County

Close-up

Strawberry Quilt 1840 - 1860
Made by Nancy Jane Shannon-Rodgers, Parkersburg, Montgomery County
The quilting averages 14 stitches per inch!

Tulip Signature Album Quilt 1951 - 1970's
Made by Stella Bonner, Knox or Clinton County
The quilt includes autographs of famous people including Richard Nixon and Neil Armstrong

Close-up with Neil Armstrong's signature

Rose of Sharon
I do not appear to have any details about this block nor a full picture of the quilt, I think because of the backlighting by daylight (you can see the cotton seeds in the batting), which made the picture too dark, but from what I can remember it's about 1840.

Whig Rose or Tea Rose 1850 - 1870
Made by Hannah Sias, Knox County, Ohio
This four block quilt was appliqued using very fine whip stitches, but quilted by a less experienced hand. Hannah was a Mennonite who emigrated from Switzerland to Maryland and then Ohio.Her daughter brought the quilt to Berne, Adams County, Indiana. Four generations of quilts made by the family are in the Indiana State Museum's collection

Close-up

Finally, I have two more pictures of quilts which whilst on display were not part of the Red and Green exhibit and therefore should have been added to part 3...

A Marie Webster designed quilt hanging next to her work-table

Florence Peto's 9 patch challenge 1995
Made by Bets Ramsey with fabrics from Florence Peto's collection.
Peto wrote to Elizabeth Richardson about the Nine-patch crib quilt she was making (now in the Shelburne Museum), Sending diagrams, she encouraged Elizabeth to do the same. Bets used the diagrams and the fabric sent to Elizabeth to complete the challenge.

I hope you enjoyed the exhibit - there is a lot to inspire!

Have a good stitching day!

USA 2013 - part 3

After indulging myself with the last post, I will keep track on quilting!

I have two very favourite shops in Indianapolis - the Back Door on the south-side and my absolute all time favourite Quilts Plus on the north-side. My friend Theresa is extremely patient with me and drives me to these much favoured quilt stores sometimes twice within 24 hours!!!

The Back Door is always a treat for me - we drop by on the way back from the airport - they are open late and as my flight invariably comes in from Washington DC at the same time as the evening rush hour... a couple of hours in the store is an excellent excuse to miss the traffic. It's funny though how Theresa always manages to miss the turn-off to the store, but I can spot it a mile off - it's the fabric calling or rather shouting to me :-)))

A warm welcome at Back Door Quilts

The Back Door always has a wonderful display of sample quilts from various patterns and I am always tempted. I would have loved to have got the pattern for Nettie and now regret that I didn't.

I don't have a picture for Quilts Plus, but at the end of my stay in Indianapolis I made 2 forays into the store with one on the way to the airport when Theresa said "you have 20 minutes!!!" The previous day, we arrived at 12.00pm and we didn't leave until 3.40pm - yes we spent 3 hours 40 minutes in the store and I will not be divulging how much I spent, but I did at least fill a loyalty card which gave me $ 25 off the bill, which does not make me feel quite so guilty!

On the way to Shipshewana, we called in at the Quilter's Hall of Fame in Marion, Indiana. 

The Marie Webster House
Marion, Indiana

Unfortunately, due to the wild weather (tornadoes!), a couple of days earlier there was no lighting and no heating in the building, but the warm greeting from the manager and seeing an exhibit of Red and Green Quilts more than made up for this.

But first some other items in the Marie Webster House...

Made by Florence Peto in 1959
Quilted and appliqued block on homespun linen background. 18th century or very early 19th century chintzes, some may even be 17th century. Fabrics originally owned by Hewlett family of Long Island. Florence Peto bought the fabrics and stitched the block. She then gave the block to Virginia Avery who then donated it to the Quilter's Hall of Fame.

Made by Florence Peto c.1959
Made from the same fabric collection as above and given to and donated by Virginia Avery

Aren't these two blocks wonderful? I always enjoy looking at Florence Peto's work whenever I have the opportunity. What I would have given to have a glimpse at her collection of antique fabrics.

Marie Webster's first quilt - a crazy quilt c.1890

A close-up of Marie Webster's first quilt

Marie Webster's work room where she designed her patterns and ran her business. Unfortunately it is rather a dark photograph.

Marie Webster's workroom

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Some of Marie Webster's preparatory pattern work

Unfortunately, Blogger is now beginning to "act up", so I will upload photographs of the Red and Green Exhibit in another entry later.

The Empire State Building - USA part 2

On a previous visit to New York, I was only in the city for about 4 hours and therefore only stood at the bottom of the Empire State Building and promised myself that on my next visit I would go to the top! 

It had been such a bright clear day that I knew that I should go now to see the sunset from the top - there were no queues (which I had previously been warned about) and it was extremely windy up there, but the sunset and the views did not disappoint as the lights came on...

                                   

                                   In the Foyer

Sunset over New York City
The sun appears to have an extra halo!

Looking towards the new World Trade Centre, Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island

The sun setting over New Jersey

Life goes on down below

Towards Madison Square Garden and Macys

Looking uptown

Looking towards the Chrysler Building starting to light up

The sun has almost gone

Lighting up in Lower Manhattan

The tip of the Empire State Building

Looking North west - somewhere below is Times Square!

Looking up 5th Avenue towards Central Park

Then I walked across to Macys, but I was too, too tired to go any further than the entrance...

Inside Macys

Thank you for looking at my blog - not a quilt related entry, but I am very proud of some of my photographs they almost look good enough for postcards! It was certainly one of the high points of my holiday.

There's more to come - have a good stitching day!

USA 2013 - Part 1

I've just got back from, at times, a very eventful trip "across the pond". My itinerary included Washington DC, New York, Indianapolis, Shipshewana and then back to Washington DC. As usual, it all went far too fast, but I had a wonderful time filled with quilts, textiles and visiting friends (not to mention my numerous trips to the fabric stores!). 

Theresa, my friend in Indianapolis had offered me a suitcase she had found in clearing out the basement, before I had left the UK, and I was determined that I would not need it for all my goodies - well, you can guess the rest!

I had a rather difficult flight to Washington DC when I developed a severe on-board migraine - which I have feared for many years. The assistance I received was wonderful and I cannot praise the British Airways cabin crew highly enough, but unfortunately, it meant I spent the first day in bed recovering. The next morning I went up to the hotel restaurant for breakfast. 

An early morning view out to Foggy Bottom

The restaurant has a spectacular view of Georgetown and Foggy Bottom right round to Watergate and the reason for this is because it is on the...17th floor - which I have no problem with until the fire alarm went off just as I sat down to a bowl of melon and pineapple - yep, we had to evacuate from the 17th floor - not a pleasant experience believe me, but was hugely relieved when a message came up the stairwell, whilst I was negotiating the 15th floor that it was a false alarm.

A very wet welcome to New York

The next day, I flew up to New York to visit the Interwoven Globe 1500 - 1800 exhibition which is on at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art until 5th January 2014.

This exhibition charts the development of the textile trade around the world from the Incas in Peru across to Indonesia and all points in-between. There were some wonderful pieces of both textiles and embroidery including Inca designed tapestries for use back in the Spanish Royal Palaces, beautifully embroidered garments from the 18th century, brightly coloured palampores from India and Indonesia, a heavily trapuntoed (corded) cotton quilt from Southern Europe which was very, very similar to the one I saw in Williamsburg three years ago, although that one is silk with cotton cords and there is another similar cotton corded quilt in the Lovely Lane Museum in Baltimore, Maryland - it is often referred to as the Mayflower Quilt (I have photographs somewhere - with somewhere being the operative word!), but in the meantime...

Silk with cotton cords trapuntoed quilt c.1600
Williamsburg, Va

Close-up of lower right corner

The original printed John Hewson coverlet from the Winterthur from which Windham Fabrics based their collection 2 years ago was also hanging and finally, for me the piece de resistance - the original Phebe Warner Coverlet - which is much, much bigger than I had ever realised. The photographs especially on the front cover of Quilts of America by the Orlofskys' do not give it justice - how I wish I could have taken photographs, but the museum have a very good website where you can view the coverlet close up. 

Phebe Warner Coverlet - probably made by Sarah Firman Warner Williams c.1803http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/13606

The Winterthur Museum have another coverlet made by Sarah - she certainly had a very distinctive style and like that coverlet the one above has a lot of silk embroidery on it with many of the pieces applied using buttonhole stitch.

If you are in New York, I would highly recommend the exhibit and the catalogue is well worth the $65.00 - it is cloth bound and has very good photographs of each exhibit with more detail about each piece.

After 3 hours in the exhibition I had absorbed just about as much as I could! It was a beautiful day and so went for a walk in Central Park, there was still a lot of autumn colour on the trees...

Central Park

Wonderful shading

There's more to come...!