The Postage Stamp Quilt

My friend, Nina, is above all, a benefactor to many. Our friendship began years ago along with her curiosity into whatever project I was working on.

I began to understand my friend’s creative nature when I first visited her in Forestville, where she and her husband, Richard, have made their country haven. Nina has the keen eye of a woman who is able to find beauty and craft among the chaos of what the world has to offer, so that when you walk into her home, you are surrounded by authentic handcrafted beauty.

One of our first projects was to make sock dolls for her two little grandsons - now they are teenagers and we have a long list of accomplishments- from window treatments to a number of restoration projects, hand knit sweaters for new grandchildren as they arrived- and Nina has become an accomplished knitter.

Not so long ago, when my friend returned from visiting her sister, she brought with her an old quilt that she had had her eye on for many years as it sat on a shelf in her sister’s cedar closet. Some occasion had arisen to cause her sister to offer Nina the gift of her choice of a quilt from what seems to have been an extensive collection of stacks of quilts.

With no hesitation, Nina responded to her sister’s offer by saying, “I would really like to have the Postage Stamp Quilt,” to which her sister replied, “Why would you want that ragged relic?” Perhaps Nina was the only one who had the capacity to see what was in the ragged relic she had chosen, except for her equally strange friend who sewed- who is me.

Who am I? Who would want to work on such a project? How is it that both of us are not looking at the tattered center, but instead are intrigued by the surface of one-inch squares that have been hand-pieced together and then hand quilted with diagonal lines that intersect the corners of each square across the surface of the 75 x 85 inch quilt.

Nina’s sister found the quilt many years ago when she was visiting the south. It is made from 1930’s Depression era cottons where you can imagine someone sewing together bits to make a quilt. They didn’t even have batting to put between the pieced surface and the backing to provide more warmth - instead, it is the pieced one inch squares and two layers of loosely woven thin cotton that is miraculously still strong.

I began to work on the quilt by removing the most damaged area, beginning in the center and moving outward, assessing as I went further and further, holding up tattered segments to the light as I looked through the skeleton of seams that was all that remained. As I held large pieces of tattered fabric in my hands, I experienced the sensation of exhausted fabric filled with emanations of hopeless poverty where little children still played on its’ surface.

When I had finished removing the old, there was an overwhelming empty large center for me to contemplate, but having access to a special fabric store two blocks from my house, “The Quilted Angel,” made the next step possible- even though it was during the Covid shutdown. At The Quilted Angel, you can find every kind of quilters cotton- from current trends in textile design, but most importantly to me, reproduction fabrics.

The ladies working that day had never seen such a quilt and we had fun running all over the store to bring bolts and bolts of fabric to the quilt so that we could find its’ renewal friends. We were on a treasure hunt, Covid-starved for excitement, as we looked carefully into an inventory of a thousand bits: 6,375 to be exact!

I came home with a large selection of one-quarter yard pieces of fabric that I would need to age with tea or ink wash in order to knock down the brightness that comes with new fabric. My next task was to tackle the math. My beginning equation was to make a 7 x 7 series of one inch squares. Then each 7 x 7 square would be combined with others to reproduce the pattern. It turned out that seven such squares were needed in each direction.

You may think, at this point, that it all became too much for me to deal with, but throughout my long career of sewing I’ve always relied on two assets that are a part of my psyche: I always want to learn something new, and I want to see what it will look like when it’s finished.

I began with graph paper, making a grid of 7 x 7 one and a half inch squares to guide me, (one quarter inch seams are always used when quilting). I felt like a painter looking at my pallet of little piles of accurately-cut squares surrounding the graph paper grid. I looked at the quilt to study the movement of color and of light and dark across its’ surface. There was one corner that had been protected from the bleaching of the sun, soiling and friction where I could see its’ maker’s original work complete with her tiny handmade stitches, the signature of an expert quilter.

Looking from the quilt to my pallet of squares, I began the most creative part of the restoration project: forming patterns of color and comment- each square had to offer what I was looking for. I even indulged in making my own hand-painted squares, taking inspiration from the miniature masterpieces I found as I studied the quilt.

When all the squares had found their place on the grid, I counted down the first row, taking the stack of seven to the sewing machine. Then, as I picked up the first pair to sew together, I called out the one to be on top. For example: tiny leaves, magenta flowers, pink dots, brown swirls. I only had three pairs to remember, so that as long as I could remember the one on top, I would be left with number seven to sew on the bottom. Each square was a difficult piecing puzzle because there were no two alike, the abstraction of the design eliminating the usual repeated pattern.

One of the most satisfying aspects of quilt restoration happens when it’s time for the steam iron to do its’ part: to block and shape the new to fit and blend onto the old. When the new has found its’ place, tiny, invisible stitches will join them together. Now, there are only four squares left to piece and hours of hand quilting before I will return the restored quilt to its’ home.

One reason why I’ve taken the time and effort to write this restoration process down is to point out what is possible for human beings to do. Nowadays, we hear about the capabilities of Artificial Intelligence and 3D Printers, but I would like to celebrate the contributions of my ancestors. I have benefited from what they learned all the way back to the first woven basket. And as I use my hands to make something, a feeling of gratitude comes for those who first pictured in their minds a needle and thread. I can see them, next to their fire, trying not to freeze as they figure out how to join their stack of small furs so that they can wrap themselves and those they love together in the first-ever quilt.