Friday 19 February 2010

Friendship Quilt

One of the unexpected pleasures of acquiring a"new" loom (I will post about this later) was re-discovering the Friendship Quilt which was a group project many years ago. I did not take part in it but have sometimes wished I had. Ethne, who was the owner of the loom I now have, had taken part and her quilt, in a lovely muted blue - her "signature colour" - is now treasured by her daughter Judy. Each of the 12 weavers dyed the pattern weft in a colour of their choosing and distributed a ball of it to each of the others. They then wove 12 squares in an overshot pattern of their choosing, one in each of the colours. When all squares were finished they were exchanged so each person had 12 squares, all the same colour but each in a different pattern. What a great day it must have been when that happened! These pictures are of June's finished quilt.

Of the 12 participants, Win, Jenny, Joan and June are still active members of the group. Joyce and Ethne both died, far too young, a couple of others have moved away and some are still around, either very busy with other things or slowing up due to health/age concerns. But they will all remember each other I'm sure. Now I would like to track down as many of those quilts as I can and learn their stories.

by Rose Pelvin

3 comments:

Esther said...

Having seen Ethne's quilt at Judy's I can vouch for the love and passion that went into it!

Why not do another round - with current members joining in.

An awesome heirloom will be created and valued. I just might end up with Mum's some day (hint, hint).

Meg said...

Could not help smiling at your hinting, Esther!

Rose said...

Esther, that sounds less like a hint and more like a not-so-gentle persuasion! I'll take it as a compliment that you would like a "family heirloom."