The richness of color, of fabric, of needlework on the old crazy quilts makes all of us ooh and aah over the artistry of those quilters who fashioned these gorgeous antiques. The book,"The Magic of Crazy Quilting" ( J. Marsha Michler 1998) says the many social changes in the years of Queen Victoria's reign (1838-1901)in world trade, railroads, communication, electricy, advances in the sewing machine, also brought changes in art. No wonder that women in their quilting, "reacting to the changes around them, attempted unconventional forms." Michler states, "The play of colors and textures placed on a quilt top and united with embroidery stitches, are every bit as artistic as the works of the painters."
The period from around 1860 into the 1920's seems to be the years considered as the time when this artform was in vogue. No one person is given credit for its beginning, it just grew and blossomed.
Just what is "crazy quilting?" It is the sewing of irregular patches, usually wool, velvets, satins, onto a foundation fabric then embellished with decorative embroidery, ribbon, lace, even beads. The general directions are to sew a five sided piece of fabric to a foundation, add random shape fabrics to the first piece, then embroider over the joining seams. The fabrics used should be rich in color and texture. In the past ladies saved fabric from the making of their gowns, from discarded articles of clothing, and also traded fabric with their friends. Wealthy women bought rich fabrics to use in their crazy quilts. (Much like buying and trading fat quarters today?)
Two years ago an internet friend found a treasure trove of old quilt tops plus a box of crazy quilt squares with a supply of the original embroidery thread. When she asked if I would complete the tops and put the crazy quilt squares together, I was excited at the opportunity. The fabrics were quite old. There was a newspaper clipping basted to one, the entry to a quilt show, dated 1930.
The crazy quilt blocks were made by a group of ladies in a lodge as indicated by an insignia embroidered on one block. They were not all the same size and not all exactly uniform in shape. There were several that were discolored and poorly pieced so I laid those aside and chose 35 to set 5 x 7. To size them, I determined a common measurement among them as about 10 inches square. Since the pieces had been embroidered I needed to prevent that from unraveling when I cut the squares to size, so I traced a 10 inch square on the back of the blocks and did a line of machine stitching on that line, catching in the old embroidery stitches and then trimmed the blocks to 10 1/2 inches.
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