Addition to the 3rd Edition

 

Here's an addition in the third edition of my Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns.

Originally, the Encyclopedia was meant to be an index to patterns published and named before 1970 but in the latest edition I added dozens of designs that hadn't been published as far as I could tell, patterns common enough that they NEEDED a number.

Like this one from the Lambertville, New Jersey Historical Society

and the Quilt Index.

 

It's now got a number: #1527.5

Among its published relatives.

It's a variation on the classic Melon Patch or Orange Peel that goes

way back.

The pattern has close relatives of a slightly different construction.

Many early 19th-century quiltmakers used a variation.

From the Connecticut project & the Quilt Index

But the block and seam lines are different.

This is #1519

Here's one way to look at the quilt above from the 1830's.

But that's not the repeat. There are no seams going through

those large squeezed squares.

When you get your new edition you are going to have to write in on page 178 under 1527.5

"See 1519."

And vice versa.

It's always a work in progress.

You don't have to wait for the new BlockBase to get a pattern. Here's one for

a 15" Four Patch.

Early 19th-c quilt from the Nichols family, Newark, New Jersey,

Newark Museum

UPDATE: Laura Lane at the New England Quilt Museum sent a photo of a mini she made from

a Jo Morton pattern.

And I remembered I'd made an appliqued mini too, interpreting a New England quilt in the Spencer Museum collection for an AQSG Quilt Study.

Path o' Gizzards

 

Texas Etsy dealer Shelby Anderson had this striking red and white quilt for sale at Shelby's Quilts.

It looks to be early-20th century or maybe late-19th by the prints---not much

to go on here. Is it pieced or appliqued?

Figuring out the repeat:

Here's the basic unit

set alternately dark on light and light on dark,

counterchange shading.

Shelby has called it a Drunkard's Path but it's not; it's more a Hearts & Gizzards

design. #1503 in the Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns.

A post with relatives:

https://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2012/02/hearts-and-gizzards.html

Grandma Dexter's Orange Peel

 

Question:

Pattern name. Found in friend Linda's estate. Merikay looked it up

in my Encyclopedia of Applique and it's not in there.

Hmmm. It's familiar and I stared at it for a while. Who would draw

up a pattern like that ? It should be pieced but it's appliqued.

Grandma Dexter, that's who.

Sure enough, here it is as Orange Peel.

The problem is that it's not in the applique Encyclopedia where

it belongs, but in the Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns where

for some obscure reason it is #3539 and it says "applique."

It's related to the many pieced patterns like this but.....

Grandma Dexter did not do the needlework world any good with

her pattern books.

People who had few sewing skills tried to figure out what "she" meant. Her theory was that all you

needed was a few pattern pieces and you could create a variety of blocks by appliqueing what would have been better pieced.

This was an efficient use of paper

Eek!

And don't be calling in with any questions or complaints.

Jonathan Winters in his slightly terrifying Maude Frickert personality

captures the whole idea of a diabolical art department masquerading

as your Grandma.

1934 Wilmington Delaware News Journal

And to complicate matters I see I have this one "Painted Snowball" indexed as coming from the Nancy

Cabot column in the Chicago Tribune. This is not Nancy Cabot? But who is it? 

UPDATE: Wilene Smith tells me it is Nancy Cabot from one of the syndicated patterns.

If I'd a been working in the art department at Grandma

Dexter's I'd have drawn this up in Electric Quilt and

shown them what it is supposed to look like. Here's an

8" pattern.

Kansas Pattern or Apple Pie Ridge Star

 

An odd pattern, odd in that it is not symmetrical in four-way mirror image repeat

like many of its relations.

Not so odd in that it is unique or even unusual.

Odd as it is, it was a relatively popular applique after 1845 or so.

Used in repeat block albums like this one dated 1844 - 1847

made for Matilda Jones Swope of Liberty, Frederick County, Maryland.

Collection of the DAR Museum

https://quiltindex.org//view/?type=fullrec&kid=16-12-187

Also seen as a single block in a sampler, this one about the

same time, pictured in William Dunton's book on his Maryland research.

Baltimore album from the collection of the Maryland Historical Society.

From a quilt in the collection of Mary Robare, the

authority on the pattern.

Mary's musings on cutting a pattern:

http://quakerquiltsandhistory.blogspot.com/2019/02/patterning-aprs-fleur-de-lys-medallion.html

It is a variation of a more symmetrical design, a fleur-de-lis.

This mid-19th-century version of the standard design looks to be cut from one piece

of fabric like a paper snowflake, folded, snipped

and opened up to reveal the design.

And who has not snipped in the wrong place and opened

up their snowflake to reveal a novel design---not quite the

intention?

Baltimore Album quilt, collection of the Baltimore Museum of Art.

Some stitchers were very adept at cutting snow-flake style

fleur-de-lis. The variety is impressive.

Quilt dated 1844 for William and Gorgianna Burris Pindle.

From the book A Maryland Album 

It looks like a mistake to me, but this pattern was handed around in some form,

not just one woman's error.

Collection of Debby Cooney

Quilters also added more motifs in the block corners.

Mid-20th century four-block from dealer Mark French's inventory

Quilt attributed to Julia Waldsmith Roseberry, (1819-1892) Ohio

Estimated date 1870-1900

These experiments in cutting with two-way mirror image 

symmetry became a standard into the end of the century.

In Virginia they call it the Apple Pie Ridge Star block

after a neighborhood where it was popular.

Mary Robare's summary:

http://quakerquiltsandhistory.blogspot.com/2019/01/the-apple-pie-ridge-guadalupe-dance.html

Karen Alexander also did a post about the pattern, showing

this block with the name in the center

"TRUE LOVER'S KNOT"

a name published in the Omaha World Herald in 1912.

In 1934 the Nancy Cabot quilt column in the Chicago Tribune

published a reader's design for Conventional Scroll.

Encyclopedia of Applique

Charlotte Jane Whitehill of Emporia, Kansas made a 20th-century version

and called hers "A Kansas Pattern".

Mid-19th-century

See Karen's post on the pattern:

http://karenquilt.blogspot.com/2012/07/apple-pie-ridge-star-quilt-pattern.html

Some late 19th/early 20th century examples, free-hand cut (?) with a variety of results.

Print this out on an 8-1/2" x 11" sheet and you'll

have a pattern for a 12" block, but be careful

in doing the snowflake folding and cutting. You could wind up with a new pattern.

I tried it on a 12" square of newspaper.

Michelle has a Pinterest page

https://www.pinterest.com/eyequilter/apple-pie-ridge-star/