The computer catalog of their quilts is a good place to start and we spent a long time looking up our friends and favorite quilters to see what works were there. We wrote down the catalog numbers and the next day, some of the quilts were presented on the tables in the viewing room you saw in the last post about the Quilt House. This is by one of my authors, M. Joan Lintault from NY. It is one that isn’t in her book so I was excited to see it. It is a printed design on the fabric and then quilted. Just spectacular detail in the leaf designs and the colors are beautiful. Here is the Libby Lehman they own. One of her ribbon play quilts with vibrant colors after all these years! Of course, Libby is on everyone’s mind in the Quilt world and we are hoping for a complete recovery so we can see more of her work! Goats by Ruth McDowell. ONe of my friends owns a large horse piece by her so I had to see what the museum had. I regret not taking a class with her! These beautiful full quilt shots were generously provided to me by the museum. Any that are odd or badly lit were ones that I took. I couldn’t get an angle to shoot some and of course didn’t have ideal lighting so it’s the best that I could do under the circumstances. Some of the quilts that are filed flat are ones that have embellishments so can’t be folded into boxes or are too delicate.For example, this is a crazy quilt made famous by being on the cover of a Penny Mc Morris book. This embroidered bedcover from 1710-1730 has lots of gold thread, very heavy and intricate. The center medallion is a bed of gold thread and I think the base fabric is silk. As a contrast, this white wholecloth quilt from 1750-1800, France, is just fantastic free motion quilting! It’s over 5 ft so just close ups here. This is a Mughal ‘floor’ quilt from the first half of the 18th century and is silk with silk embroidery, wood-block cotton print on the reverse side. The embroidery is tiny here and amazing! I wonder if it was truly for a floor or a repro of an image on a floor? The vibrant colors of this silk were a standout and I could study this for hours. It is one of the 3 quilts that I found inspirational because of the small pieces used in the quilts. I’d like to try creating with tiny pieces. Here are the other two below. Detail in the Gallery. Pieces were about half inch at the smallest center. Made by Bertha Neiden in Lincoln, NE about 1910 of wool and probably wool scraps from clothing! Wool and felt pieced by hand! It reminds me of many gameboards all together! More photos coming in future blog posts!