Repairing a quilt

My philosophy of quilting is that it is both a fine art and a practical art.

The fine art portion is that I think even a "stash buster" quilt should somewhat be coordinated in the colors/patterns chosen, as judged by the quiltmaker.

The practical art part is that quilts are meant to be used and loved, not "displayed."

Also, at least in my view, another part of the "practical art" side of them is that when they wear out, they should be fixed to the best ability or the quilt owner, and not just thrown out (I suppose this is kind of "depression era" thinking, even though I am way too young to have lived in the depression. but it is still my opinion)

The problem is that, there are very few people today that can fix a quilt. I will make the random stab that perhaps 1% of the population (it might be more, like 5%, but I really do not think I am going out on a limb to say it is a relatively small proportion of the population). I put myself at, I suppose, the bottom of this 1% that has the sewing skills to repair a quilt.

Well, I have a quilt that was made by my grandmother that is in quite a need of repair to be useable. It is not a "family heirloom" and I really don't think it has much value as a museum piece, but it does have meaning to me and is a sort of "personal heirloom."

I think that it is a crib quilt that was made when I was born, but I am not sure about that, the reason being that it is a bit big for a crib quilt, or at least bigger than I would make a crib quilt (~56" x 70"), but since I am the only living person that knows anything about the history of this quilt, or even that it exists, that is my story and I am sticking to it.

Well any, let me try to describe it:

It is a patchwork quilt with the squares being about 8" finished size, but the squares are not pieced like a -square, etc.

They are solid pieces of material in 5 different colors, solid white, and purple, yellow, pink, and brown plaids, with the "stripes" in the plaids being about 1/4" or so wide.

It doesn't have any framing around it, but one end of it has what I will call an extension, perhaps because my grandmother did not have enough of the other materials to make another row to get it to be ~70 inches long.

The following are my ideas about fixing it:

The extension looks like a rabid dog got at it and just chewed it up, and it is well beyond repair. It needs to be totally replaced.

As for the squares, the white, pink and black are in good shape, but the yellow and purple are pretty much worn out an need replacing.

I have 3 ideas about how I can repair them:

The first is to replace the purple and yellow squares with solid white ones, and just make the quilt have a higher proportion of the solid white squares than it originally did. I think I have enough white material in my "stash" to do that.

The second is to go to the fabric store and match the purple and yellow plaids as closely as I can and use those for repairing it.

The third is to choose some colors that I deem "appropriate" out of what I have in my stash and use that to repair it.

In my stash, I have 2 plaids that are very different from the plaids in the original quilt.

One shares some of the same colors as the original quilt, specifically the purple, pink and white, but the stripes are much wider (~1") than the original.

The other shares some of the colors as the original, namely yellow, pink and white with the original, but in this the "stripes" are of varying widths.

The reason that I am thinking of using these plaids, even though they are radically different, is to make a very large contrast between the original quilt and my repair job.

There is also a place on the back that needs repair, but my idea for that is to put a label on it that gives a bit of history of the quilt, and have it say something like "originally made by Ruth Sherwood, 1961, repaired by Brian Christiansen, 2015," rather than just cutting out a piece of white material and patching it that way.

I was considering putting up some pictures for this, but my apartment is too dark to for the pictures to come out. Perhaps I will try again tomorrow when I can open my curtains and let the sunshine in.

For those who use metric, 1" is about 2.5cm, 56" is about 140 cm and 70" is about 175 cm.

Brian Christiansen

Reply to
Brian
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Well, Brian, I don't think I quite go along with your philosophy (or only in part). However, you will only be satisfied with the result if you do what you really want to do.

I have a couple of suggestions: one is to cut out a few squares of the colours that you suggested for each of the three repair methods, and pin them in place. Then leave the quilt 'around' for a few days (each) to see what you prefer.

Sec> My philosophy of quilting is that it is both a fine art and a practical

Reply to
pat on the green

Sometimes quilt repair can be overdone. Sometimes the fabric is so old and deteriorated that it doesn't pay to try to fix it. You might fix some spots now and in a few weeks or months other worn out spots will show up. Just my two cents worth. I haven't seen your quilt so I don't know that it fits into the category of "not worth repairing" and I have no suggestions for your repair.

Julia > My philosophy of quilting is that it is both a fine art and a practical

Reply to
Julia in MN

Perhaps you are correct, and some sentimentality about the fact that my grandmother made this quilt is clouding my judgment, and in any other situation, I might look at it as being beyond repair.

However, I still feel that many people are still too quick to throw stuff out before even trying to repair it.

In many cases, stuff today is in fact made so that it is cheaper to simply replace it than to repair it.

Sometimes things are made so they cannot be repaired.

That does not change the fact that I would like to repair this quilt and get "more life" out of it.

Brian Christiansen

Reply to
Brian

Because you really value the quilt, you might contact a textile conservator for advice about how to repair / stabilize it.

Nann

Reply to
Nann

I have a tough time letting go of sentimental stuff too. I think being able to fix a quilt is more prevalent than someone that is willing to fix one.

I would take the bad end off and just shorten the thing. If there is anything there that is usable I would try to incorporate that in the repair. Without pics it is tough to say what would look best but that you go ahead and just do it is the important part. When I work with old stitchery I wonder about the person that did the original work and try to make improvements they would be happy with. I think your g'ma would just be tickled that you are saving and cherishing in whatever way you choose. I like the whole idea a lot. Taria

My philosophy of quilting is that it is both a fine art and a practical art.

The fine art portion is that I think even a "stash buster" quilt should somewhat be coordinated in the colors/patterns chosen, as judged by the quiltmaker.

The practical art part is that quilts are meant to be used and loved, not "displayed."

Also, at least in my view, another part of the "practical art" side of them is that when they wear out, they should be fixed to the best ability or the quilt owner, and not just thrown out (I suppose this is kind of "depression era" thinking, even though I am way too young to have lived in the depression. but it is still my opinion)

The problem is that, there are very few people today that can fix a quilt. I will make the random stab that perhaps 1% of the population (it might be more, like 5%, but I really do not think I am going out on a limb to say it is a relatively small proportion of the population). I put myself at, I suppose, the bottom of this 1% that has the sewing skills to repair a quilt.

Well, I have a quilt that was made by my grandmother that is in quite a need of repair to be useable. It is not a "family heirloom" and I really don't think it has much value as a museum piece, but it does have meaning to me and is a sort of "personal heirloom."

I think that it is a crib quilt that was made when I was born, but I am not sure about that, the reason being that it is a bit big for a crib quilt, or at least bigger than I would make a crib quilt (~56" x 70"), but since I am the only living person that knows anything about the history of this quilt, or even that it exists, that is my story and I am sticking to it.

Well any, let me try to describe it:

It is a patchwork quilt with the squares being about 8" finished size, but the squares are not pieced like a -square, etc.

They are solid pieces of material in 5 different colors, solid white, and purple, yellow, pink, and brown plaids, with the "stripes" in the plaids being about 1/4" or so wide.

It doesn't have any framing around it, but one end of it has what I will call an extension, perhaps because my grandmother did not have enough of the other materials to make another row to get it to be ~70 inches long.

The following are my ideas about fixing it:

The extension looks like a rabid dog got at it and just chewed it up, and it is well beyond repair. It needs to be totally replaced.

As for the squares, the white, pink and black are in good shape, but the yellow and purple are pretty much worn out an need replacing.

I have 3 ideas about how I can repair them:

The first is to replace the purple and yellow squares with solid white ones, and just make the quilt have a higher proportion of the solid white squares than it originally did. I think I have enough white material in my "stash" to do that.

The second is to go to the fabric store and match the purple and yellow plaids as closely as I can and use those for repairing it.

The third is to choose some colors that I deem "appropriate" out of what I have in my stash and use that to repair it.

In my stash, I have 2 plaids that are very different from the plaids in the original quilt.

One shares some of the same colors as the original quilt, specifically the purple, pink and white, but the stripes are much wider (~1") than the original.

The other shares some of the colors as the original, namely yellow, pink and white with the original, but in this the "stripes" are of varying widths.

The reason that I am thinking of using these plaids, even though they are radically different, is to make a very large contrast between the original quilt and my repair job.

There is also a place on the back that needs repair, but my idea for that is to put a label on it that gives a bit of history of the quilt, and have it say something like "originally made by Ruth Sherwood, 1961, repaired by Brian Christiansen, 2015," rather than just cutting out a piece of white material and patching it that way.

I was considering putting up some pictures for this, but my apartment is too dark to for the pictures to come out. Perhaps I will try again tomorrow when I can open my curtains and let the sunshine in.

For those who use metric, 1" is about 2.5cm, 56" is about 140 cm and 70" is about 175 cm.

Brian Christiansen

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Reply to
Taria

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