In Stitches

If you love seeing the stitches in old quilts, no doubt you admire Amish quilts. But did you know that Welsh quiltmakers have been making quilts in their own style for perhaps even longer than the Amish? And on the dramatic dark color wools and flannels, the hand quilting stitches show beautifully.

Good news: Jen Jones, an American who lives in Britain, has opened her excellent collection of Welsh quilts to public view at a new museum. Please click on this link to see the video clip from BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/8179225.stm.
Ms. Jones also has a beautiful website and sells a book about Welsh quilts http://www.jen-jones.com/ definitely a 'must see' if you're going to England.

The image at the head of this blog post is a close-up from a Welsh wool wholecloth quilt that I own. Bought on ebay, I was surprised when it arrived and discovered that the backing was a damask linen tablecloth dyed bright red! My apologies for the crummy quality of the overall picture but you can still discern the interesting designs.

Warning: if in England and you see a quilt that looks like a traditional Amish Center Diamond, do not comment as I did-you might get in trouble! Me at the Malvern quilt show years ago: "What an unusual Amish Center Diamond quilt! Grey, red, black, and forest green..." A dark-haired woman rounded on me immediately:" I'll have you know that's a Welsh Center Diamond and the Amish got the design from us!" Oops.

Welsh Quilts

Old quilts have always served as inspiration to my own work and Welsh quilts, as in from Wales (the western-most region of Britain) are one of the oldest sources of America's quilting tradition. The photo is of a little sample quilt of Welsh-derived design that I show in my Quilt Marking class.

Most often Welsh quilts were made of wool and hand-quilted in whorls, spirals, and other Celtic-like designs. These primarily wholecloth quilts are enjoying a huge revival in the UK. Their patron is no less than Prince Charles whose most famous title is Prince of Wales.

Charles and his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, bought an estate in Wales and refurbished it to serve as a royal residence when visiting in the region. Eleven Welsh quilts were bought from a transplanted Yank, well known antique quilt dealer Jen Jones. This video, if you watch it through to the end, takes the viewer on a tour through the estate and you'll see quilts both on the walls and on the beds. Here's the link: news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/7470135.stm .

Occasionally a wonderful Welsh quilt comes up on ebay. Good luck finding one at a reasonable price now that His Majesty has joined the ranks of antique quilt buyers! Here's one that went way out of my price range very quickly. The front is bronze-y green and the backing bright orange. Why don't more of these Welsh quilts turn up? It could be that out of desperation, many Welsh quilts were rolled up, stuffed in the stove, and burned as fuel to keep warm. No kidding. An older Welsh lady told me she remembered her mother doing just that when times were tough.