anyone Whole-cloth quilt

13 years ago

My DGM's people use to do something they called "whole-cloth" quilting. They used 2 large single pieces of material to make a quilt/blanket. (if one one large piece wasn't available, they set the seams at the edges of the mattress top.) The material was usually white, but on occasion a very light color.

Then they used their quilting stitching to portray a farm scene, or a wooded scene, or a flock of birds, a school of fish hiding under a log and brush,...

Sometimes, the stitching was done in all white thread, sometimes the color helped portray the scene, and sometimes is was all one-color thread like "Redwork".

On rare occasion a colored material with a repeated patterned stitching ( i imagine it was much like the patterns i see "Long arm quilting machines" do today, was used, but I only heard of two of DGM's Aunts doing that style.)

I was just curious if anyone does that style of quilting now. l.marie

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Comments (13)

rosajoe_gw
13 years ago
The first quilt I made was a whole cloth quilt. I was so 'green' I didn't know it was called that until many years later. When I started quilting in the 80's patterns were not very newbie friendly lol!!!! I wanted to make a quilt and didn't understand the instructions. This is 2 white sheets and I drew the design as I went. No one I knew quilted and there were no online forums (that I knew of!).
I still have some of the old magazines and the patterns are very vague. This took me 3 years to complete and won a second place ribbon. I didn't learn to piece until I retired 5 years ago.
Rosa
K8Orlando
13 years ago
Check out this link to see the whole cloth quilt that won the $100,000 quilting challenge in 2007! It's by Linda McCuen; she calls it Bella and it is bella indeed.

Kate

Here is a link that might be useful: Linda McCuen's
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I did notice this thread, Rosa, but I didn't know enough to help with an answer. I once saw a TV program in Japan on which the sashiko technique was demonstrated, and it was simply running stitches in a rather coarse white thread taken on an indigo background. It happened not to be quilted. What most impressed me was how the stitches had to be done in such a way that, for instance, where several lines came together, the stitches had to fall so they radiated out exactly the same distance from the meeting point. I was intrigued, but never got around to doing any sashiko. Not really to the point, but by a sort of free association process, this reminded me of the quilted cleaning rags my mother-in-law used to make out of old towels and other suitable throw-away materials. She would fold them to get an oblong of about 8" x 10" and then hand-quilt them with coarse stitches in various simple patterns. Nothing curved or fancy. The Japanese use these "zoukin" as cleaning rags or for wiping tables off, and so on, and when we moved to the States, she gave us a pile of them. I can hardly bear to use them and spoil them, and our mother is now 94 and in a nursing home in Tokyo. A true thrifty Japanese lady of the old school. I used to make zoukin, but on the sewing machine! Once I saw a funny Japanese cartoon featuring a "difficult" mother-in-law. The daughter-in-law had spent a lot of time and effort making zoukins and was hoping to be praised, but the mother-in-law was telling her they were no good because, in THEIR family, the quilting had to be done in another pattern.
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msmeow
13 years ago
Rosa, your quilt is beautiful! A whole-cloth quilt is something I would love to make some day. Just haven't gotten the nerve to start one yet!

You can get whole-cloth tops that are pre-printed with the quilting design. All you add is the batting and backing and quilt away!

Donna
blitzyblond_protege
Original Author
13 years ago
Oh my Gosh! I have talked to family and a few local quilters and heard "no one does that kinda quilting anymore." and even met a few quilters in their 50's that had never heard of it. And here ya all have shown me that not only is it still done it is definite presence in the quilting mainstream. THANK YOU, THANK YOU.

Rosa: DGM & family mostly made theirs out of sheets as well, and they hand drew it as they went too. Your quilt is beautiful and the pink trim makes it look delicate. Your center pattern is far more intricate then the simple outlined scenes my elders use to do. TFS I hope those are pictures you have on file and you didn't go to that much work just for a novice's benefit.

Kate: to think a style I thought was nearly dead is worth that much money. The link was great and the detail they showed on that quilt was amazing. That truly was the Best.

Donna: I would have never imagined that there would be something like pre-printed tops for a desperately dieing art. Thank you for opening my thinking so much.

All ya all are so wonderful. Thank you all, l.marie
mary_c_gw
13 years ago
I beg to differ that whole-cloth quilts are a "dying art". They are an evolving art. (And, by the way, some of the preprinted tops are lovely!)

I see many quilters - both hand quilters and machine quilters - making wholecloth quilts. But many of these quilters now embellish their quilts with thread painting, paints, crystals, etc., or they use a fabulous batik or print for the fabric. Others are very traditional in the designs they choose to use, using a muslin or white. They are all still wholecloth quilts.

All of these are valid choices, and wholecloth quilts are not dying out.
Robbi D.
13 years ago
Rosa!! That was your first quilt??! I'm totally impressed. I feel lucky to stitch in the ditch. That is beautiful. I'd love to do one of those when I have A LOT more confidence.

Robbi
calliope
13 years ago
The quilt circle at the church my husband used to attend made one each year to auction with the proceeds going for more materials and to the church. The last year they did this, the quilt auctioned off was an whole cloth in off-white with amazingly intricate and skilled hand quilting design. I think hubby bought half the tickets and we won. Certainly well worth the couple hundred he invested in tickets.

He apologised to me that it was not pieced. Ha! I was thrilled with getting what I got. It looked as if it fell off some colonial plantation of the 1700s. Whole cloth quilts preceeded pieced ones and were usually fashioned by ladies of leisure who had the means to afford large pieces of uniform material and who studied needlework as the mark of gentility. Piece work was a later craft and often by more common citizenry.

I would love to make an whole cloth quilt, but I enjoy piecing more than hand quilting. Neither am I a meticulous hand quilter. I suspect people who tie into an whole cloth quilt might enjoy the quilting process more than the piecing end of it. It is not a dying art, but is often the milieu of experienced quilters. Rosa your first attempt at quilting deserves a ribbon indeed.
petalpatsy
13 years ago
Rosa! Thanks for the pictures! That's lovely, lovely work, and the pink binding is a delight. Whole cloth needs to be on my 'to do' list!
nanajayne
13 years ago
Rosa I am more impressed with your quilt then the one that won $100000. Yours shows a talented beginner, who used sheets--they are terrible to quilt thru-who quilted by hand on a design that she created. It was a prize winner that is truly lovely. Thanks for sharing the inspiration.
I have never done a whole cloth quilt but noticed that the back of the one I am doing now almost qualifies.LOL
Jayne
blitzyblond_protege
Original Author
13 years ago
everyone, I must have worded my response all wrong, I'm sorry for the confusion.

I guess the statement should have been more direct. "I would have never imagined that there would be something like pre-printed tops for WHAT I WAS PREVIOUSLY CONVINCED WAS a desperately dieing art. Thank you for opening my thinking so much.

This was an art for that I do not HEAR about around here, even at our county' largest fair. I was just curious if ANY-ONE heard of it anymore. Those first three responses opened my mind with a whole new understanding of the art in its current form; moreover, the rest of you have continued to broadened my education on an old family memory. Thank you all again. l.marie
K8Orlando
13 years ago
Quilting, like scrapbooking and many other arts/crafts, is a true subculture. We have shared knowledge, a language that people outside the group don't readily understand (whole cloth, fat quarters, SITD, free motion, long arm, etc), recognized experts, an army of talented amateurs, lots of fanatics, retreats, stores, internet shops, trends, revivals and all the other things that go with a culture, including subsets (hand quilters, longarmers, appliquer, paper piecers, SunBonnet Sue-rs!). We may not be as visible as biker gangs, but we are just as true to our society! There are millions of us and probably billions of dollars generated by what we do every year. I know you didn't mean that quilting was dead, especially after all you've learned here recently. But you are only beginning to stick your toe into this world. This wonderful forum is just one small corner of it.

Hey, do we have a secret handshake?!? No one's told me about that yet!

Kate
calliope
13 years ago
What a wonderful thread this has been. Loved your post Kate. It's very affirming to see our craft plod on despite ipods, satellites and gene splicing.
rosajoe_gw
13 years ago
Thanks for your kind comments!!! I am one of those that prefers the hand work, including putting on binding. I was a single parent, stressful job, and the quilting was relaxing. This quilt was made using a 12" embroidery hoop. Whole cloths are easier to hand quilt than pieced due to the lack of seams. My first pieced quilt (not long ago) was cut so bad that I gave up on it lol!!!! To this day cutting fabric or trimming blocks is my least fav. I even like pressing more than cutting.
Rosa

anyone Whole-cloth quilt

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