Everything Old is new Again

[Busy Quilting]

I had the opportunity yesterday to visit a display of quilts from the "prestigious London Victoria & Albert Museum" on display here in Brisbane Australia.

The Australian Museum in Canberra has also allowed the "Rajah Quilt" to be displayed for the duration.  This quilt is very significant to Australian Quilters.

 

No pictures are allowed so sorry can't show you anything.  My pages of scribbled diagrams don't do it justice either.

 

BUT can you imagine an almost 60 year sitting on the floor in front of a 1725 coverlet that was equisitely emboidered with back stitches that would make any machine quilter or longarmer drool.  The feathers 1/4" wide in wonderful formations of Dianne Gaudynski's vases, Jamie Wallen flurries etc.

Freehanded baptist fan type spirals like Angela Walters, Judy Madsen only 1/4" apart.

 

No they are not new ideas we are now using, it was hard to believe the top is almost 300 years old.

 

Security hovered close by but I think they might be used to people propping and drooling.

[LFQuilts]

I had a similar experience several years ago when I visited the The Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum in Williamsburg, VA.  There was  an exquisite display of antique quilted clothing (skirts and vests) - several of which were quilted with a tiny meander.  Silly me, I had thought of meandering as a modern development. Thanks for sharing your drawings!

[Beachside Quilter]

Wonderful idea to sketch the quilting designs, Lyn!  Sounds like a fabulous day!  Thanks for sharing!!

[Anniquilter]

Lyn,  this exhibit sounds wonderful! 

 

I have been following Esther Aliu on her blog 'Esther's Blog' and she visited this exhibition too.  She is also working at recreating a quilt from the 1700's which she found in a book from, I think, the 1960's.  That quilt's whereabouts are now not known.  She is recreating it as a block of the month as a way of preserving its history. 

 

It is true that 'everything old id new again'!