America's Quilting History

The 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition was a big event in Victorian society. One of the most popular exhibits was the Japanese pavilion with its fascinating crazed ceramics and asymmetrical art. Women were eager to incorporate this new look into their quilts and with the help of popular women's magazines the making of crazy quilts became quite the rage. This enthusiasm over crazy quilts continued until about 1910.

Crazy quilts were more show pieces than functional and were often made as smaller unquilted "lap robes" that were used to decorate the parlor. They were fitting showpieces for the lavish interior decoration of the day. These crazy quilts were made using velvets, silks and brocades, cut and pieced in random shapes. What a perfect way for women to show off their needlework skills! Using silk thread, women placed lovely decorative stitches on each seam. Intriguing names like feather, herringbone, fly and chain describe just a few of the intricate stitches. The imagination and skill of the seamstress was the limit.

To the Victorians the word "crazy" not only meant wild but also broken or crazed into splinters; a good description of the look the various triangles and other odd shapes gave to these quilts. Although crazy quilts may appear haphazard they were carefully planned. Hours were spent cutting shapes and trying out various arrangements of the pieces. The following quote from an 1883 article in "The Chester Times", Chester, PA. gives an idea of how they were made.

"If your pieces are of good size, and all fresh and handsome, one way is to cut out blocks of cotton cloth, either square or diamond-shape. Cut enough blocks to make the quilt the desired size, then paste on the pieces of silk, satin, or velvet; lap the edges and turn the upper one under; then cover every seam with feather-stitch, cross-stitch, or any fancy stitch you can invent. "

We find a great variety of stitching styles and embroidered motifs on these quilts; sometimes small pictures were even painted on the fabric. Animals and flowers seem to be the favorite embroidery patterns. Some quilters believed that embroidering a spider on it's web would bring good luck to the quilter. Crazy quilts occasionally included embroidered verses and information recording family events.

Contemporary women's magazines published embroidery patterns and offered ideas to be used on the new "crazies". They even sold packets of silk scraps to make them with. Playing on the word crazy and they gave plans for "crazy" tea parties using mismatched invitations and other "crazy" themes. Some articles even suggested that women should be careful as not to go "crazy" while working on these quilts.

Crazy quilts were also popular for fundraising. Sometimes churchwomen would even write to famous people asking for a piece of clothing that could be incorporated into the crazy quilt they were making to raise money to help the missionaries, build a new church or other worthy cause. What a great conversation piece such a quilt would be!

Originally these quilts were made by those women in the wealthy classes who had the time and the money for the expensive materials. Before long, other women got in on the fad and found ways to make their own crazy quilts. Some were made from the fancy clothing of the day that had been discarded or passed on to less affluent relatives. Women soon adapted the crazy quilts to be used for such fabrics as flannels, denims and other cottons. These quilts did not always have the decorative stitching and instead were often simply pieced.

Women soon adapted the crazy quilts to be used for such fabrics as flannels, denims and other cottons. These quilts do not always have the decorative stitching and instead are often simply pieced.

Sadly the quilts made with silk in them are rapidly deteriorating, in part because the Victorian silks were embedded with metals to give them rustle and weight. Experts in quilt preservation do what they can to save the old silks and when that is no longer possible some take on the painstaking task of renovating the quilt while carefully preserving the original embroidery. Someday these historic quilts will only be found in pictures.

References:

"Clues in the Calico" by Barbara Brackman

"Quilts a Living Tradition" by Robert Shaw

Thanks to quilt historian, Sue Reich, for sharing this quote.