Wednesday, May 9, 2018

Southern Charm

Collection of the Charleston Museum #1992.45.2
106" square.

The Charleston Museum's annual quilt show comes down at the end of this month. Piece by Piece: Geometric Quilts features pieced quilts from their estimable collection. I noticed that this featured quilt, an Irish Chain variation, has a lot to do with our Antebellum Album block for this month, the block I'm calling Quaker Pride.

Becky Brown's Block #4 plus 2 setting blocks

I figured out that the Charleston quilt is two
separate blocks. 

The block of blue chintz is a double
nine patch much like the alternate block in our official set---different proportion.
The block that looks like the Quaker Pride album on point is
actually the same block shaded differently.

I've seen this simple and effective pattern in a couple of other quilts. MESDA has this pretty child's quilt from the Marion family in South Carolina. Again the double nine patch is a consistent fabric with the alternate album scrappy. A striped chintz border frames it.

Harriet Kirk Marion (1782-1856)
Berkeley County, South Carolina 58" x 44"
Collection: Museum of Southern Decorative Arts MESDA

On the reverse: a label added later says this small quilt was made for her granddaughter Harriet Marion Palmer born in 1830.


My third example is also Southern. I found it in the Georgia project book Georgia Quilts: Piecing Together a History.
This one is red and green and looks later than the chintz examples, perhaps made about 1860.
 The caption:
"Aunt Ollie's Quilt (Irish Chain Variation.) Makers said to be slaves on the Northern Glover Plantation near Albany (Dougherty County, Georgia.) 101" x 109".

I drew it up in EQ. It's a block of 25 squares based on a grid of 5.
I used 2" finished squares cut 2-1/2". Each block finishes to 10".

One block is shaded like this.

The other block is shaded like this

49 Blocks makes patchwork 70" x 70"
It would make a great charm quilt if you could control the shading
into light, mediums and darks.

With a chintz border of about 6" it would be 82" square

It's a cool design but it IS a large quilt made completely of 2" squares.
A crib quilt may be more do-able. Note the vintage examples that are over 100".

See more quilts in the Piece by Piece: Geometric Quilts at the Charleston Museum. It's up till May 31.
https://www.charlestonmuseum.org/exhibits/current/30/piece-by-piece

3 comments:

Nann said...

Thanks for charting the design, Barbara. It looks much more intricate than it is. I think it would work up well in any fabric genre (and scrappy as well).

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Barbara. This is a great 2-block pattern and would be good with American Hero Quilts. I could do it as a leader-ender, too!

Sue McQ said...

Beautiful design. Thanks for sharing. Need to put this on my to do list. Blessings!