My first vintage quilt

(click pictures for enlargements)

This is the quilt that sparked my interest in antique and vintage quilts.  I purchase the quilt top at a flea market in Iowa.  It was extremely dirty and everyone thought I was nuts for wanting it, but I thought I could “save” it.

It took a good long soaking and plenty of oxi-clean but it cleaned up pretty well.  A few spots didn’t come out but overall not to bad.

At the time I didn’t know much about fabric dating so didn’t have any idea how old it was, but it sure looked old.

I often see wedding ring quilts for sale on eBay (it really is a very common pattern) but some sellers represent them as being older than they are.  The pattern didn’t exist before the 20’s

Heres is a great article on the history of the pattern http://hartcottagequilts.com/his7.htm#DWR

I had an appraisal done on the quilt by an AQS appraiser and it was dated to the 30’s

I hand quilted mostly following the piecing.  In the white sections I just made up a pattern….I used masking take to get the lines straight ( I had yet to discover makring pens)

I used white muslin for backing fabric

here is a close up of the quilting

I used Hobbs cotton batting and washed the quilt when I was done.  I love the puckers that are caused by the shrinkage.  To me it makes it look like an antique should

I eventually sold the quilt on eBay.  I don’t know why, but I get almost as much enjoyment selling a quilt as I do making it.

I do have several more tops in the wedding ring pattern waiting in line to be quilted.  They are a bit more unique than the first one.

This one (above) is made from mostly shirting fabrics

The mustard yellow is different in this one and the piecing is unique, each melon segment is done in only2 fabrics and the pieces are very narrow.  Unfortunately this one has been washed by someone so it will need a lot of trimming to remove all the frayed threads, as well as some mending to fix a few open seams.

Ann Champion has a very similar quilt top done with different colors, lots of red.  Its a great post see it here on her blog http://annchampion.com/?p=45

This one was once quilted with a blanket for batting and some very ugly backing fabric folded over to the front and squaring off the edges. There were a few rows of machine quilting to hold it all together. I was very happy to take it apart and find it all intact.

This one is missing a few of the green segments around the edges. I’m not sure I will be able to find a matching fabric.  perhaps It will need to be made into a smaller quilt.

I have a lot more plans than time so it might be a while!

Happy quilting!!

Tim