Day 26 - A Magical Month of Antique Quilts - Super Christmasy Quilt

 This is one of my most Christmasy quilts!  Staghorn applique pattern, antique quilt, circa 1860. Starley Quilt Collection. Of course, red and green proclaim the holidays, and the holly berry style wreathy appliques do too. Click on the picture to enlarge and see the details - such as all the embroidery that makes this quilt delightful.

Here's the full antique quilt. It is always interesting to see how the earlier quilters arranged their applique designs. This unknown maker aligned the 4 ferns to face to the center, focal point applique.  

I also like to see how makers figured out their borders and got their designs around the corners. This quilter made each border separately, starting in from the border width and continuing to the corner, repeating 3 more times. A great method that avoids having to make the borders meet in the corners. Note - if the border designs are not continuous, you don't have to worry about them matching :) 

A bit of the folky border. Actually, the whole quilt is a bit folky and I really like that. Folky and informal is more fun than precise and formal design.

Day 17 - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Quilts - Starley Quilt Collection

 More 9 Patch Fun! Another Uneven Nine Patch from my collection. This one is quite early and has some fabulous fabrics. And something very special ...

Amazingly, it is signed and dated 1836 in teeny crossstitch! It is so awesome to have a name and date on a patchwork quilt like this. Such a great resource for dating the fabrics.

Setting the 9 Patches on point makes strong graphic lines, especially with all the red fabrics.

Day 3 - Month of Antique Quilts - Starley Quilt Collection

 Thanks for stopping by for another installment of this month's blogathon of antique quilts from the Starley Quilt Collection. 

Lovely this Wild Goose Chase in an awesome red zigzag setting! Such a bold choice. And a tricky one as there a lot of partial seams to create that zigzag.

This quilt top is from Michigan and is likely a time-span quilt - blocks made by one quilter and joined/ sashed by a second quilter. It wasn't finished which is a good thing for me as I like to share it in trunk shows and tops are much easier to schlep around than quilts.

Antique Quilts - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Red and Green Quilts - Day 31

 The last day of our monthlong celebration of antique red and green quilts from the Starley Antique Quilt Collection features a variety of Birds and Blooms  - stars of my virtual/online trunk show: Birds and Blooms.

Four block Eagle and Tulip Medallion Quilt from Southeastern Pennsylvania. Circa 1865/70. And part of its extra folky eagle (or dove) friends. They also hail from Pennsylvania.

A detail of an adorable crib quilt - circa 1850.

Part of another adorable crib quilt from the same time period, I do love Birds and Blooms!

Detail of a very unusual quilt that features birds, fish, and roosters in the border!

Two birds from my Quilted Joy antique quilt - pattern available to make your own mini version!

A bird from another circa 1850 crib quilt - this one from Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. Yes, I like little quilts, especially if they have birds and flowers!!!

And finally, a delightful bird applique from a circa 1855 basket quilt from New York State! Enjoy!

Antique Quilts - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Red and Green Quilts - Day 30

 This is a wonderful antique quilt with an amazing paisley sashing and great red and greens and blues and more. The icing on the top is that it is an early signature quilt to boot.

Interestingly for a signature or friendship quilt - the focus is on the fabrics rather than the names which are written in corners of the background. Usually, names are placed in the block centers especially with a star block like this one.

Isn't that paisley border bold and beautiful! A star of my Signature Quilt trunk show and my Antique Stars lecture.

The full star quilt from Hunterdon County, New Jersey (Western NJ, just across the river from Philadelpia). It is an early signature quilt and has dates of 1841 and 1842. 

Antique Quilts - Monthlong Celebration of Antique Red and Green Quilts from the Starley Collection

 Another different Red and Green antique quilt from my collection- enjoy! This is one of a small group of Tumbling Block Stars featuring solid fabric center stars made in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in the 1880s. My friend Greta and I have found about 15 and fellow collector Pat Nickols found quite a few too. So I think that at least 30 of them were made at that time and place. 

Here's one of mine with the distinctive center star (above) made of only solid fabrics and generally the only solid fabrics used in the quilt. And look at the stars around the central stars - note how carefully she matched the three sets of fabrics used in each star. Look at the lower right star and notice how nicely the two pinks match each other, as well as the two browns and the two purples. \Click on the photo to enlarge - there are 6 different prints in each star.

This is the only one I've seen so far with a diamond braid border which is a great finish! This maker was very careful with her color placement to create the twinkly Tumbling Block Stars. Again, note how carefully she was to match the three sets of fabrics used in each star.  So many different fabrics. I think several different ladies made the quilts based on workmanship and fabric coordination (some didn't pay attention to color placement and lost some stars). I think they traded fabrics to get such close matches. Great variety of prints - look at the two Madder orange paisley prints in the star below. 

Also wonderful novelty prints like this circus dog jumping through a hoop - one of the all-time best novelty prints!

Antique Quilts - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Beauty - Antique Red and Green Quilts

 I hope you have been enjoying this peek into my antique quilt vaults! This month has just been the tip of the antique quilt iceberg. I'm happy to share them NOW in VIRTUAL antique quilt trunk shows over Zoom and then in person once we can travel again.

Today's red and green antique quilt has lots of red and green (and pink and yellow and ...) but it isn't a traditional red and green quilt. It sure is a HAPPY quilt though. Circa 1855,1860s Courthouse Steps quilt pattern (variation of the Log Cabin quilt pattern) from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Starley antique quilt collection.

Here's the full quilt top. Isn't it a happy quilt? I'll bet you are smiling! Purchased from my friend Molly of Fourth Corner Quilts. Thanks Molly.

Antique Quilts - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Red and Green Quilts - Day 27

 Red (with green) antique quilt! A sparkly, starry quilt made by Quakers living in Southeastern Pennsylvania (Delaware County) in 1850. Starley Antique Quilt Collection

Love how beautifully arranged it is and how lovely it looks both up close and from a distance.

Antique Quilts - A Monthlong Celebration of Antique Red and Green Quilts - Day 26

 Today's antique treasure from the Starley Antique Quilt Collection is a striking red and green antique Princes Feather or Princess Feather quilt. It is an amazing 4-block quilt with awesome details. I think it is the perfect antique Christmas Quilt and it makes me smile as the feathers look like the German Christmas pickles.  Circa 1850, likely from Ohio. Part of my virtual trunk show, Birds and Blooms. Yes, I am now doing virtual antique quilt lectures - giving you lots of up close and personal looks at the treasures in my collection. I don't just show you my regular trunk show, I revamp them with LOTS of additional photos!

Look out all those teeny sikes/notches on the feathers and those teeny sawteeth in the sashing. And that the double star in the feather centers! Be sure to click on the photo to enlarge and see the details.

And here is a close-up of one of the border corners with a delightful spriggy star flower. But the coolest thing about the border treatment is the maker used circles in the 4 corners to artfully turn the corners. This is one of two antique quilts I own that use this ingenious technique. No matter where your border vine ends up in the border area, you can connect it to the corner circle and voila, you've rounded the corner!!!!

Another way of explaining this:
 ***Here's a huge trick for making a vine applique border work right -- put a circle in each corner and then each side of the vine can go join to the circle where ever it needs to and go from there.