Bluework Garden

Bluework Garden is the 2009 charity quilt the guild made to support the Southern Tier Food Bank and the Broome County SOS Shelter. The blocks were machine pieced, hand embroidered and hand quilted by many members of the guild. The overall design of the quilt was done by Louise A. Tiemann. Guild member, Vicki Wilson coordinated the construction and quilting, and she pieced together the quilt top and added the prairie point edging.

Twenty-four of the floral motifs are based on a series quilt pattern, Old English, published in the Woman's Magazine and Amusement Section of the Cleveland Plain Dealer in 1933-34. Margaret Techy adapted the designs from early Jacobean embroidered textiles she saw while visiting the Victoria & Albert Museum in 1931. While in London, Margaret saw a photograph of a patchwork velvet panel, dating back to the second half of the 16th century. She made a sketch of it and designed this quilt along similar lines. Each design is within a circular medallion adapted from old English embroideries of the 17th and 18th centuries.

The remaining six motifs were adapted by Louise from the book 'Embroidery and Design' by Joan H. Drew (1916). This book illustrates floral designs within circular medallions, very similar in style to the Margaret Techy designs.

The embroidered 'braiding design' on the borders were adapted from a vintage redwork quilt in the collection of Kris Driessen, shown during a presentation Kris gave to CTQG in 2006.

Photo taken by Carol Bunnell.

Common Threads ~ making uncommon quilts!