Vintage Quilt Top

Can This Quilt Be Saved?

 

I bought this vintage quilt top

last year on the internet. I had

stored it away until I had the time

to work on it.

I'm a member of a Quilt History Study 

Group here in Lancaster; so when I 

saw this piece for sale I was so excited!

I recognized some of the fabrics from

about 1890 - 1900. But I wanted to bring

it to the Study to make sure.

Now when I say a "piece" for sale I mean

that the seller called it a "cutter quilt".

I clicked on "buy" and bought the piece.

Later I went back to view the piece again

and I noticed that there were SIX OTHER

PIECES for sale! So I e-mailed the seller

and asked if they were cutting as they 

sold or if the rest of the quilt was

still whole. 

To my relief; they said it was still whole

and asked if they should cut another 

piece for me....NO!!  I will buy the 

remainder of the quilt "UNCUT"!

When I received it in the mail I was

so excited! Granted it does have some

torn spots but it's Queen size!

Just look at these old fabrics!

This is just one piece of the corner

of the quilt that was cut. The quilt

was not quilted but tied.

You can see where some of the pieces

are torn. 

Here's the back....

All hand stitched with small stitches

and straight lines. That's a lot of

work for all these pieces and queen 

size! 

That's one of the reasons that I would

like to salvage what I can. 

I noticed that one of the blocks were

repaired.

Front view of repair

Back view of repair

What I did so far to this piece is

I removed the back and the batting.

The quilt did have a funny odor sort

of like a chemical smell. I had to

put it outside in the shade to air

it out for a couple of days. Taking

it inside at night. 

Here I just removed one block that

was in shreds. I will continue to

remove all of the damaged blocks on

this piece before I work on the rest

of the quilt.

It will take me a long time but I 

believe it will be worth it.

I will post the other part of the 

quilt very soon.

Happy Quilting!