Quilt Flap Details

There's been a bit of confusion about the Quilt Flap. It is neither a strictly academic happening with papers being read etc., nor is it simply a quilt show. Rather the Quilt Flap is a hybrid event--part show-n-tell, part information about antique quilts, and lots of socializing and, of course, it being the South, refreshments will be served. Right now our date is June 21 and our meeting place is in the auditorium at The History Place, a museum in downtown Morehead City, North Carolina devoted to local history of this area. Their website is here www.thehistoryplace.org and the map is pictured to the above right.

At this time, we envision the Flap as a glorious one-day event but there will likely be other happenings as well.For instance, I'll offer quilt classes at The Quilt Studio on Thursday and Friday (June 19 and 20) prior to the Flap. Lynn Gorges will have her conservation studio www.textilepreservation.com open in New Bern, NC (45 west of Morehead City on Highway 70). I'll be talking to local quilt shops as well and we'll see what other trouble we can stir up! More will be revealed....

What's the flap about quilts?

A few like-minded friends are starting this blog to see and hear more about antique quilts. We collect them and treasure them. Sometimes they're old and ratty and the smell makes you sneeze. Other times you find a mint-condition quilt that's been tucked away in a trunk for the last half-century! You never know. Lynn Gorges from New Bern and I decided quilt fanciers in this area (coastal eastern North Carolina) needed a reason to get together and have a big show and tell session. We called the idea a "quilt flap." This blog seems like a good place to start. In the future we want to hold a confab, a meeting here on the coast, where all "quilt flappers" could get together and ooh and ah over each other's quilts. We're thinking mid-summer, around June 21st.

I'll kick it off with one of my most interesting quilts, (detail upper left) sniffed out at an antique shop. The quilt had been on display for less than 48 hours. When I saw it, I turned red, then white, and my husband Rod said, "Breathe, Pepper, breathe," as we hauled the quilt down from the wall --it was tucked in one of those silly display rings-- and I ran to the register. The pattern looks to be some home-grown version of Mariner's Compass. I love the great folk-y hearts and spade shapes appliqued between the spokes of the wheel. And the colors! My favorite shade of Prussian blue, oxblood brown, and of course, the golden-orange collectors call cheddar.