I'm surprised...

After working on the Frankenstein wall hanging, the turn of the century print that looked like a lace overlay was on my mind.  Did I have more of these kind of prints that I never gave much attention to in the past?

This is the original fabric I called "wild".  As I said, it reminded me of a Battenburg Lace overlay.  

For reference to what I'm saying, this is handmade Battenburg lace.  At one time it graced the collar of a woman's dress.  It is intricate and very beautiful. 

 So a search through some of my vintage fabric produced a piece which measures 35" from selvage to selvage.

Detail of the vintage lace below.

The colors are correct in this image.  Black background with the magenta and ecru lace.

Then I looked through my quilts to find this design style.

After checking out my fabric, I found a print I bought in the 1990's - The Sheryl Roy Collection for South Sea Imports:

Meller and Elffers' in  Textile Designs, categorized this design "Eyelet, Lace, and Netting".  Fabrics of this design suited the copperplate-printing technique allowing for very fine detail and making their mark in the late 19th century.  The design pictured below from the late 19th century looks as though it could have been the inspiration for the South Seas Import piece pictured above.

Image from Textile Designs by Susan Meller and Joost Elffers, page 283.

So I said I was surprised...and I am.  I am surprised more fabric designers haven't picked up on this design sensibility and making a reproduction line to satisfy all the lovers of Steampunk.  

Maybe the original block with the lace design wasn't so "wild" after all, and that I find surprising!

Heart of the Madder......

For anyone trying to find a gift for the lover of textiles, look no further, I have found the perfect present.

I want to share with you one of the best Christmas presents I received from my family many years ago -  Textile Designs by Susan Meller and Joost Elffers.

Back in the early 90's it was difficult finding books with color illustrations of textiles and the range of printing dates for those fibers.  This wonderful resource allows the reader to not only identify their textiles, but it gives a concise history/explanation of the dye/technique to further discover if you have properly identified your fabric.  There are 1,823 color plates that cover a two hundred year period for European and American patterns from fabrics worn by everyday people.

While the WWW has its merits, I love being able to put a stack of quilt blocks on the table and find what I'm looking for from a hard copy resource.  Oh yes, these square within a square quilt blocks do have madder dyes (that's me talking to myself).

So I'll post a few more of these blocks that date around 1860-1880.  There aren't the conversation and shirting prints of 1880's so I'm putting them in the earlier time frame.  Oh look, madder plaids!

Textile Designs besides giving wonderful color identification, breaks down the textiles to design techniques.  Once you see examples of fondu, picotage, serpentine, diaper, eccentrics, you will be on your way to dating 19th century fabrics.

I never saw a foulard design I didn't like.

Now, onto preparing for the holidays at my home this year.  I'm starting to put out the Christmas quilts throughout the house.  This is what I have hanging in my dining room.  I made this from the Moda fabric collection and small wall quilt pattern designed by Minick and Simpson called Christmas Past.  I loved Minick and Simpson's creative use of the red/green/white palette and simplified design to interpret an 1860's historical quilt. It looks perfect on my walls which are a rich pumpkin orange and golden spice.