I'll Fly Away!

I'm pretty excited about this! I got a great bargain at the resale shop on this beautiful twin size airplane quilt. I've seen the airplane pattern, but never have seen one of the old quilts. The fabrics are mostly stripes and almost all different. It has a few holes and some fraying on the edges but, to me, that just adds character.
As I looked at this quilt I got really curious about the history of airplane quilts. Obviously, they didn't date back to the 1800s, but I know that this one is pretty old (probably from the 1st half the the 20th century) so I started doing some research.

The first airplane quilt block pattern appeared in 1930 to commemorate Charles Lindbergh's solo transatlantic flight in 1927. I think my quilt might be later than that time period, but was probably sewn within the next 20 or 30 years. The more modern airplane quilt patterns I've found are much more 'arty', and have a more contemporary rounded shape in applique. I'll be interested in finding out more about airplane quilts in the future.

What is Barkcloth?

In a previous post, I let everyone vote on whether they liked some vintage barkcloth I'd just gotten. One of my readers asked what barkcloth is. Here's a brief explanation:

Originally, barkcloth was actually made from the inner bark of certain trees, beaten flat and made into fiber.

What we think of as barkcloth, though, is cotton, linen, rayon, polyester, or fiberglass fabric made from the 1930s on and really popular in the 1950s & 1960s. It was fairly thick and sometimes nubby and had a texture to it. Even though it's thicker than a clothing cotton, it's soft and was used in throw pillow, upholstery & cushions and draperies. Here's a picture of a cornice I built & covered in a soft floral vintage barkcloth. The big curlicue pattern used to fill the blank space was common in barkcloths.

It had all kinds of patterns from big florals to tropical themes to sputnik-era designs like the one I just bought, pictured here:

Here's a very typical color and pattern I picked up a few years ago. The burgundies, pinks & greys were really popular. In the second picture, you can see the pattern well.

This is another floral I've gotten. This type of floral always looks upside down, because there are flowers going both ways on it. The pattern, which you can see in the second picture, is totally different from the one above.

Barkcloth is being manufactured again in a variety of retro patterns, but most people really like the vintage ones the best. The fabrics can be pretty expensive (up to $40 for a good-sized piece) and often are stained or imperfect -- you just learn to work around the imperfections (just like we do with our friends)!

People are using barkcloth to make all kinds of things -- especially purses & totes. Go to www.etsy.com and type in barkcloth -- you'll see the variety! You can check out different patterns of barkcloth and shop for them here or at http://www.buybarkcloth.com.

Lily's Quilt

Christy wanted me to post something about the quilt I made for Lily. When I gave it to her, I told Crit that I would, but now it seems like boasting -- forgive me if it seems like that to you, too!

The blocks in Lily's quilt are from animal patterns found in "Claire's Cats" and "Grandma's Bunnies", along with others that I made up because I wanted more variety. The fabrics are primarily Aunt Grace's (a reproduction line of 20s and 30s fabrics) and a few vintage ones that had enough strength to stand up to play. The polka dots, which also are the backing fabric, are an Alexander Henry called "Pop Dots" and I know that I bought every yard (and piece of a yard) available online throughout the country (because there is no more available anywhere)!

I love the outdoors and animals and hoped that Lily would have fun learning the animals and colors, discovering the patterns in the fabric and counting. This is, by far, the most fun I've had making a quilt and (I think) the best one I've ever done. The more I sewed, the more my imagination ran away with me and I'm really pleased with the result. Here are pictures of the blocks -- thanks for looking!