Quilts have been a an expression of American women over the past hundred years. Quilts are being reappraised by historians, art critics and a growing public as a form and expression of American folk art. The creativity of generations of American women is gaining recognition for their quilts.
Quilts are no longer stored in closets and trunks. Happily quilts are finding their way back into our lives and homes. Many quilts can also be found on the walls of galleries and museums in the world. Quilts have come to be a remarkable design tradition which has developed in the United States, since colonial times.
By the mid-eighteenth century there were three distinct English needlework styles used in quilts which had found their way to America. First there was the appliqué covers, pieced patchwork (stitched shapes) and quilted whole cloth coverings.
In the 1770’s a religious revival movement called The Great Awakening was offering a more generous and loving picture of God. This was important in the story of quilting because it transferred the responsibility for moral and religious education directly from the clergymen to the women in the home. Women established an environment where training would be offered to America’s future citizens. The nineteenth century encouraged the creation of a well-ordered and comfortable domestic setting.
This new domestic way of life was the main reason for the development of needlework and quilting as occupations for women. By the 1800’s it was considered necessary and proper for a young lady to do needlework in order become a better homemaker and companion.
After the Revolutionary War and again after the War of 1812 the American market was flooded with manufactured goods. These included fabrics. It became family traditions for neighborhoods to gather for functions – these were often composed of women – needlework and quilting were take the shape of becoming what is known today as quilting bee’s.
Quilting took a social and involvement of entire family for weddings and births. Husbands and brides-to-be drew complex patterns on a quilt top or cut out templates from which patterns were cut. Grandmothers and children threaded needles and cut out patterns, while mothers sewed pieces together and quilted the op. A quilt represented the creative efforts of an entire family.
The manufacture of cotton was America’s first national industry. It became a well-applauded talent to make something beautiful out of a basket of old scraps, and the creation of a handmade quilt symbolized womanhood.
The growing middle classes with a network of women’s sewing circles, often associated with churches, became a reform. Quilts were made to benefit worthy causes. Together with continuing tradition of bees, quilting, get-togethers, fairs, and auctions, quilts were the new social acceptance.
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