10 Modern Versions of a Traditional Art Form: Quilting

I love quilts! I love all the intricate patterns. I love all the pretty colours. I love the homey feel they give a room.  And I love the story behind each quilt.  I am always amazed by how much time and care goes into making quilts.  

Pottery Barn

I did a little research about the history of quilting and found it really interesting.   The earliest quilts - some dating back to ancient Egypt - were whole-cloth quilts.   We tend to think of quilting as a way that people used up small leftover pieces of cloth, but that was only true after the 1840s and 50s when two important events happened - the industrial revolution resulted in affordable commercial fabrics and the sewing machine was invented.  Prior to the 1840s only the wealthy had time to stitch quilts - everyone else was consumed with spinning and weaving cloth for the family to use as clothing and linens.  Wealthy women engaged in quilting as an art form and as a way to develop and show-off their needlework and display the expensive materials they were appliqueing.  When the use of commercially-purchased cloth to make clothing at home became widespread, it meant that women had the time to save scraps of cloth and sew them together to make beautiful pieced quilts.  Thus it was from the mid nineteenth century on that quilting entered the mainstream and became a popular craft form.

quilt/kwilt/

Noun:	A warm bed covering made of padding enclosed between layers of fabric and kept in place by lines of stitching.
Verb:	Join together (layers of fabric or padding) with lines of stitching to form a bed covering.

There are many different types of quilts - there are whole-cloth quilts, applique quilts, medallion quilts, block quilts, crazy quilts and many others.   In recent years many creative souls have come up with amazing modern versions of this ancient and traditional craft.  I was really surprised at the variety of lovely modern quilts when I started Googling and pinning quilt pictures.  Maybe these modern types of quilts are only new to me, but just in case you have missed the surge of creativity out there too I thought I would share what I found.

Let's have a look at ten new creative ideas for quilts:

1.  Raw edges - in these quilts the seam edges are turned to the outside instead of being carefully hidden away as they traditionally are.  As the quilt is washed the seam edges fray and turn soft and fluffy.

Bloom

2.  Strip quilts - I love the simplicity of these quilts - just strips of cloth sewn together to form a quilt.  Sometimes the strips are even and sometimes they are different widths.

Twin Fibers

3.  Zigzags - I love the simplicity of these quilts too, although something tells me they are a whole lot more complicated to make than the strip quilts.

Bea Spoke Quilts

4.  Circle quilts - the circle pattern is pleasing to the eye, but I bet all that sewing on a curve takes a lot of skill.

Cluck Cluck Sew

5.  Rainbows - I saw variations on the rainbow theme in many different patterns.  They are such a fun way to organize the scraps of material.

Quilting Gallery

Maniacal Material Girls

6.  Ruffle quilt - aren't these so pretty and feminine.  They must takes lots and lots of material to make each row of ruffles.

Urban Outfitters

Is her fake sleeping adorable or what?  from Under Construction

7. Map quilts - some of the map quilts were maps of whole countries, but the ones that caught my eye the most were quilts showing the streets of a town or city.  Wouldn't they be a great quilt to give as a sentimental gift.

Apartment Therapy

Ian Hundley, Oberg White at The Cork Board

Have and Hold Design

8. Souvenir/memory quilts - I've seen quilts that people sign to commemorate an event and quilts made pieces of favourite t-shirts or using ski bibs (like in the quilt below).

ski bibs Prints Charming

9. Picture quilts - the skies the limit with picture quilts.  There were endless styles of picture quilts so it was tough to narrow it down to only two.

EschHouseQuilts

Daniel Rouse

10.  Modern abstract quilts - these quilts look like modern art with amazing variety in form and colour.

French Knot

by Sherri Lynn Wood at Dainty Time

Sampaquita Quilts

For years I've had a secret desire to sew a quilt, but haven't quite got myself organized to make one yet.  While I love traditional quilts, I found these modern ones so inspiring and creative.  I'm not sure which type I would make - if I ever get around to it - as they all appeal to me in different ways.  Have you ever made a quilt?  What types do you prefer - modern or traditional?

 

WISH Wednesday #26

When I saw this pretty bedroom with aqua walls and red accents I thought it would perfect for a spring WISH Wednesday.   I love pretty much everything about this room - in fact I love it so much I pinned it twice on Pintrest on two separate days.  Is that love or is it memory loss? Hmm, hard questions.

House and Home

This room perfectly contrasts the sweetness of light pastel colours in the white and aqua with the bold red accents and the dark wood bed frame and flooring.  I love the natural wicker in the baskets and rug at the foot of the bed.  I love the stacks of vintage quilts on the wicker trunks.  I love ... pretty much everything about this room.  


Is this a room you would pin twice?  (It's now the new Pintrest rating system)

 

Spring Trends - Coloured Glass

While I like to think I'm not influenced by trends in decorating and the decor in our house is timeless, in fact I know that isn't true.  I try to spend our hard-earned money on things that will stand the test of time and that I will love for years to come, so when it comes to trend reports I tend to view them with a jaundiced eye.  This time however, when I read the three spring trends that Style at Home magazine has come out with, I was impressed (you can read more about them here, here, and here).   


So lets have a look at what direction they are predicting home decorating will be going and how I see those trends fitting into our house.


1.  Florals - I've always been a closet Laura Ashley lover - even in the days of no florals during the past decade or two - so to hear that florals are making a come-back is very exciting.  Now I have been taught well over the past decade or so and I can't say I would be considering covering any large pieces of furniture in florals any time soon, but to buy bedding or kitchen towels or pillows or rugs or art or dishes covered in flowers - well count me in!

See we already have a floral duvet cover

2.  Orange - While I'm warming up to orange, there just aren't many places that I could see putting orange around my house - especially the Pantone's colour of the year, tangerine.  We have little bits of bright pure orange in the basement and accents of a rusty orangey brown colour in the living room, but that is about it.  So while I don't have any objection to this colour it doesn't suit our house very well.  I would definitely wear this colour and I could see putting a tangerine tablecloth on the table as I use tablecloths in any colour.

3.  Coloured Glass - Not only do I like coloured glass, but the trend is specifically for my favourite colours - glass in pale blues and earthy greens.  I'm all about blues and greens and this is definitely my favourite of the three trends. 

In fact I liked the idea so much that I went around the house and gathered all the blue glass I could find and arranged it on a chest in the living room.  I had never had them all in one place before  - I liked it!   


I really felt I should do my duty to incorporate some of the other spring trends so I bought some orange tulips to add to the display - they hit both the orange and the floral trends, right?  ;)  I love blue and orange together so this was definitely a winner with me.

 

When I gathered the blue glassware from around the house I was surprised by how many memories were attached to the containers.  Some of the glassware was just from HomeSense or the dollar store, but several pieces were from family trips we have taken around Ontario or even to England and one was from our son's wedding last year.

So what do you think - do these three spring trends appeal to you?  Will you be incorporating any of them into your home?

Easter Update

I hope you all had a lovely Easter with lots of good food and truckloads of chocolate.  I know I did!


I showed you the pink tablecloth from Bangladesh that I was going to use for our Easter dinner so I wanted to show you a picture or two of how the table looked with all the dishes on it.  I tried to stick to pink, gold, and white in the dishes and table linens although I didn't have enough serving dishes in those colours so had to add one that had some black flowers on it.

And the carrot cake looked very similar to how I decorated the first half that I served my friend, but my friend lent me a little rabbit for the garden.  Which meant that "our garden" was being nibbled on by both mice and a rabbit.  

Linked to Table Top Tuesday at A Stroll Thru Life

An Easter Lunch

I hope you are all having as lovely sunny weather this weekend as we are.  The sunshine is so welcome.  We have flowers all over the house and Easter eggs on display and branches of pussy willows - spring is definitely here.


As I mentioned when I showed you the Carrot Garden Carrot Cake (which you can read about here) I invited a friend over for an Easter lunch so we could have a visit and enjoy the dessert.  I had so much fun decorating the table for our lunch that I wanted to show you around.

I couldn't decide which tablecloth to use so I asked for William's input and this is the one that he thought was the most springy.  I love this tablecloth for its natural linen colour and the pretty sprinkle of wildflowers across it.  It was one of my first thrift store finds from several years ago and it still makes me happy when I put it on the table (although it doesn't iron as smooth as some of my tablecloths because it is made of linen).

The other thing I like about this tablecloth is that it coordinates well with my blue and white dishes so that is what I set out for our lunch.  I also used our blue and white Pottery Barn serviettes and the orange Mickey Mouse napkin rings (more because of the orange than the Mickey Mouse I might add).  I like how even the salad coordinates.  

For lunch we had salad with tons of different vegetables layered in the Anthropologie bowls, finishing off with the red pepper and carrots so it looked pretty.  I also added sliced egg on top just before we ate.  We had the carrot cake for dessert.  It was so yummy.

At the other end of the room is the fireplace and I recently switched out our mantel decor.  It had been a very busy, but fun rainbow arrangement (which you can see here) so I wanted something soothing and simple this time around.  The sap bucket on the right side of the mantel was sent to me by Donna at Anglo in Quebec when I won the chalkboard sap bucket (which I have been meaning to post about, but want to get some chalk so that I can write on the chalkboard ...  it would make more sense after all.  You can actually see the chalkboard bucket on our sideboard in the first photo).  It was so sweet of her to send the extra sap bucket along and I'm loving having these tall containers to display nature in.

And finally I want to wish you all a very happy Easter - from our family to yours!