By Julia M Brennan & Caring for Textiles Team
Saturday June 8 & August 10
Caring for Textiles is hosting a quilt care & repair clinic, and tour of the exhibition “Pattern & Paradox”. Click here to register.
Yet, we came to know each maker by her needle skills, sense of color and eye, her humbleness, sensitivity, sense of devotion, expressed in the infinite beauty and abilities of the Amish quilt makers. …… ‘what a piece of work is man…’ (Shakespeare Hamlet, 2.2.295)
Two years and 800+ hours of work preparing the Amish quilts for exhibition, reminded me why I really love this work. Our work as conservators involves ‘touch’; ‘touching’ each of these quilt 5+ times, both sides, each quadrant of color, the bindings and fine lines of stitching. The Caring for Textiles team examined and vacuumed each quilt, documented fibers, condition, colors, and stitching patterns.
These sessions started always in awed silence, taking in the geometry, colors and sculpted composition of each quilt, each a textile reverie. Stillness was followed by expressions of joy and rapid chatter about certain colors, Y seam joins, and the nearly invisible quilting stitches. Wondering aloud who were the unknown makers of these masterpieces?
We start with stacks of archival storage boxes, and slowly documented 50 quilts – measurement, examination, written and photographic records, and proposals and calculations for repairs and preparation for exhibition.
Our many weeks of examination and documentation establish a baseline for the actions required for safe exhibition, as well as future custodianship. Our conservation records, populated with narrative and images, accompany each quilt in its ongoing life.
This collection is in exquisite near pristine condition. Almost a century old; the colors are vibrant, with stitching intact, as if they were made today. Known as ‘Sunday Best’ and not regularly used on beds, they were clearly very well-tended to by their Amish makers and families, as they passed from generations, and finally out into the hands of non-Amish owners. While many of the quilts were displayed over the years, they were beautifully cared for; showing almost no signs of wear or exhibition fatigue.
The quilts are predominantly made with exquisitely fine wool challis or batiste, traditional dress fabrics for the Amish. The other most prevalent fabric is cotton plain weave and sateen, the latter often used for wide borders or the backings. The surfaces, all solid color fabrics, are literally ‘sculpted’ in hand quilted motifs of roses, baskets, wreaths, twisted ropes and feathers. We executed selective hand stitched repairs; for such a large collection, the amount of treatment was proportionally minimal.
Marking the areas of damage for later treatment. The detail shows how we stabilized the corners of with minimal ‘re weaving’ of the long loose wool warp threads. To further protect and strengthen for exhibition and the application of Velcro along the back edges, the repaired but fragile corners are encapsulated with sheer tulle netting.
To achieve a flush-to-the-wall and smooth ‘painterly’ like presentation, we did a lot of hand stitching! Velcro on 3 sides of each quilt! Applying 200+ yards of Velcro loop on twill cotton tape with hand stitching. The Velcro is aligned along the back edges, and secured by catching the back lining, and through to the front at intervals, careful to pierce an existing quilting hole.
600+ feet or 200 yards of cotton twill tape 600+ feet or 200 yards of 1” and 2” wide Velcro hook and loop 1000 linear feet of slats prepared with 200 yards of hook Velcro
Installation of each quilt, was an 8-day corp-de -ballet choreography
Our sincere thanks to SAAM’s amazing staff and to the donors Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Brown, who further enhanced our knowledge about these remarkable quilts.
Caring for Textiles is hosting two quilt care workshops at SAAM – June 8 and August 10, 2024
https://americanart.si.edu/events/conservation-workshop-caring-quilts-august-10-2024
https://americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/pattern-and-paradox
All photos by Caring for Textiles; Julia M Brennan, Kaitlyn Munro, Katherine Hill McIntyre, Annabel Dobbyn.
Lovely to see each ‘baby step’ you take for the care of these quilts. They are beautiful; the colors remain so vibrant!
What an incredible project and how wonderful to see the quilts restored to their like-new state
of vibrant colors and designs.
Hi Julia,
Another AMAZING project..!! Thank you for sharing as always.
I am now thinking I need to consider a volunteer position with your team when I retire..!!
Hae a great day.