Channeling Ruby Short McKim

In a couple of days, I'm heading to Olde Sturbridge Village here in MA, one of the many living history museums in the USA where one can step back in time while wandering a village made to look like 1830 and rejoice that we no longer have to add Ye to the front and extra "-e"s to the back of all adjectives. I'm to be the featured entertainment at Cornerstone Quilt Guild's annual luncheon, which will be held in OSV's Tavern, which come to find out is not really a tavern at all and both the program director and myself are slightly miffed by this, as this will not be the weekend I get to give my lecture tipsy for the first time.

Drat.

In any case, since the lecture is to occur at a "history place" as my seven year old history geek might say, and because it is to be my "Plays Well With Others" group quiltmaking lecture, I thought this morning "What better time to pull out those weird redwork blocks I bought from Ebony Love a year or so ago with historical themes and finally put them together? Because, you know, I only have twenty seven other projects going right now."

The blocks were redworked (in blue) by either Ebony or someone else, thus ensuring that if I put it together it will be a collaborative work, and are, in all honesty, a little strange. Obviously all of them are Colonial America themed, but some of them are downright crazytown. Observe.

Yepper. I'd be pulling my hat down over my face if I were in the stocks. How embarassing.

Is this REALLY a depiction in redwork of a young squaw throwing a hatchet at a bound man? I can't make it anything else, but I am disturbed by it.

I call this one "Guy Smiley, Hunter." This is the only person with a face on any of the blocks, and the smile turns the whole thing into a parody of goofballism to me.

I looked up some info about these blocks, as I was pretty sure they must have been designed by someone other than Ebony, who is not known for her redwork or for her whimsical depictions of Colonial America, and found out that they were originally designed by Ruby Short McKim in 1927. According to one source: "Ruby McKim's Colonial History Quilt, this pattern was originally featured in the Kansas City Star Newspaper. The newspaper sponsored a contest beginning in December 1926. Every week for 24 weeks an embroidered pattern was published in the Saturday society pages along with a description of each design's historical significance. The contest offered the winner $80 in gold. Women ages 19 and older were eligible to win first prize." 

Would that I could find the actual descriptions of each design's historical significance. Then we might know the story behind why the maiden was angry enough to throw a tomahawk or why the goose hunter returns looking like a scarecrow. But unfortunately I didn't find anything on the individual blocks.

Admittedly, I didn't look very hard. I wanted to get this post up before the girls get home from school. In Colonial America, as now, honesty is the best policy, so there you have it.

Here are some more of my favorite blocks:

I feel forlorn just looking at these Pilgrims watching the Mayflower sail away.

This is the only block with red in it. Made it challenging to place in the quilt, until I realized it really didn't matter.

The Beginning of Free Market Capitalism.

I had NO idea currency used to wear little berets. Oo la la!

So with the lecture looming, I whipped all of these into an actual quilt top today, using every. last. bit. of what was quite literally the only red fabric I own.

I know. It's almost impossible to see the actual redwork. But I promise it is there. As is that little bit of selvedge in the bottom right corner. It really was a fight to the death between myself and 3/4 yard of that red fabric, and the fabric won. I will be quilting this tomorrow morning and will be sure to put a binding on slightly wider than normal to compensate.

I was just about done when I realized that in a moment of crazed rotary abandon, I had sliced a bit of one of the corners off. I literally rooted around the garbage can for a tiny piece to sew on and make it square again.

Here's hoping Cornerstone will appreciate my efforts to bring them a history-themed group quilt. If not, at least my daughter will appreciate snuggling up under coins wearing French-inspired head wear and criminals hanging out in the stocks. Doesn't every kid dream of such things?

Modernizing the Crap out of Quilting

Modern. It's the buzz word of the decade. I challenge you to enter any LQS around the country and not be boinked on the head with the word at least 15 times in the course of your visit, be it from the cover of patterns, the description of fabric lines, or even the cool haircut on the owner, which can be counted if you are struggling to find 15, but I doubt you will.

It's outside of the quilting world, too, with Target showing us "Fresh, Modern" palettes in everything from their towels to drink cups. As if the year 2013 invented the color orange, thereby making it "modern."

It's even at antique shops, where "upcycling" has become the way to "modernize" everything from barn doors to yellowed books to glass jars. I've even done a little upcycling myself, as evidenced by my-library-card-catalog-turned-quilting-tools-holder.

File that under "C" for "Things that can Cut you badly."

A lot of it I really love, but I shudder when I see people painting a gorgeous piece of furniture from 1862 and then "distressing" it for that "modern" feel (Begging the question - is distressed the way we are all supposed to feel in 2013?); having once stained an early 1800s desk the wrong color only to be told by an appraiser I had just "ruined all of its value," I can't even go there in my mind.


With that said, if you are just arriving to check out my blog today during a break from painting your grandmother's china hutch teal.....um.....welcome! It's no secret that I don't keep my feelings to myself, but I always respect the rights of everyone to do as they see fit in life even if I couldn't do it myself, and a teal china cabinet is no exception. You know without a doubt I applaud the color choice in any case. But overall, let's be honest, I'm over this modern thing.


A couple of weeks ago designer Ebony Love went on a tear in the quilting world, calling out designers for putting out stuff that is less than stellar in the names of money, fame, fortune, and deadlines in a blog post called "The Dumbing Down of the Quilting and Sewing Industry". She'd had it up to here with poorly constructed quilts and patterns that in her mind were not worthy of industry standards, and she had no problem telling it like she saw it. My only issue with what she said was briefly worrying that she was about to kill off my "Perfection is Overrated" lecture, but since I've had a few inquiries over the past week I guess we're good, and I am confident we are both on the same page when it comes to imperfect vs a big old mess. What has made me crazy about our industry and the "Modern" movement over the last few years is along the same lines, so with Ebony having blazed the trail, I'm feeling free to share my opinions. Not that it usually takes someone else to blaze that trail, mind you. (I've linked her blog post to her name, and I encourage you to read it at your leisure.)


Modern quilting: "Many people describe it as breaking-the-rules quilting, reflecting the personality and individual style of the quiltmaker. .......... quilts which may differ from traditional quilting through new approaches to fabric combinations, piecing, construction methods, and motif quilting."

Okay. Um, hello. I've been breaking the rules and making up new piecing techniques since 2005. And not ONE person cared enough to realize I was a modern quilter when modern quilting wasn't cool. Heck, I didn't even know it! Woo hoo! I'm ahead of my time! I bet by that definition just about every one of us is a "modern" quilter. But I bet if you are to ask Susie Q. Hottie, average American quilting hottie, what she thinks of as modern, she might also add negative space, squares, circles, and and heavy machine quilting. All of which, don't get me wrong, are great elements in a design and I love them individually and together. A quick search on Pinterest for modern quilts is going to give you every one of those things in spades. (Well, actually, spades is one shape I DIDN'T see in that search, but if you find one let me know.)

But here's the thing: How many times can we as the quilting community get excited about one more quilt featuring - wait for it - squares and rectangles surrounded by white or gray? How many more times are we going to accept a design in a magazine that is basically a log cabin done in "modern" fabrics? Or ooh and ahhh over a quilt that is mostly negative space with one crazy star or hexi strategically placed? Or clamour to buy a pattern by a well known designer that we could have figured out on our own because it really is just a nine patch or churn dash or any other public domain block featuring their new fabric line?

Before anyone thinks this is sour grapes on my part because I've apparently been modern for forever and am not raking in the fame over it, consider this:

It's baaaaa-aaaack.

I have repeatedly referred to this thing as "The stupidest quilt I have ever created" and I mean that wholeheartedly. It is fourteen strips of fabric sewn together, with a "modern" border made of squares. I put the top together in 4 hours while blind in one eye from a contact lens solution incident, proving that it takes literally NO talent or special skill to make, vision even being optional. It ended up on the cover of a major magazine, has been kitted by shops, has been a mystery class at least once, is the pattern more Susie Q. Hotties contact me to tell me they have made than any other, and has forced a spin off pattern which is my #2 best seller, all because it is "modern."

I love that this pattern has made people so happy. It makes me happy, too, because it is pretty and sweet and is accessible to every quilter no matter how newbie or advanced they may be. I love that it put me on the map a bit in this industry. And as much as I want to be able to just bask in that, I can't get beyond the fact that it is a ridiculous pattern, and one that I believe is popular only because of that "modern" element. And that feels a little bit like selling out, and that makes me die a little inside.

I've never been one to design for the masses; I design what I love and if the pattern catches on, I'm thrilled. I truly believe that there is a place in our industry for all kinds of designs, and as fun as it is to catch a wave of a fad like this quilt did for me, from here on out, I renew my vow to design from the heart, not from the whims of the industry, as I truly believe my designs are better when they are more me and less trend, and I hope a few of you might agree. I can't expect the rest of the industry to follow, but I know I will feel better about what I am putting out there.

I'm going to call it my "Post Modern" era.