New Pictures of an Old Favorite

I'm going through quilts, trying to get better pictures of some of the old ones I've almost forgotten. If I don't have a decent picture, I sometimes forget I have the quilt, and this astounding Barn Raising Log Cabin is one of those.

It is made of silk, c. 1940. I bought it from a seller in Ohio back in 2005, and a couple years later it was displayed as part of the Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival as part of Shelly Zegart's Log Cabin exhibit. Wish I could've gone. It must be quite a spectacle to see the Tokyo Dome full of quilts with endless lines of people waiting to get in to see them.

It's a really interesting quilt, made during a period when there weren't as many silk quilts being made as in the earlier, Victorian period. It was actually made in the heyday of feed sacks and mass produced cotton calicoes, and that makes it especially curious. I really have to ask myself, "Who would've made such a quilt?"

The thing I like most about this quilt is the optical illusion of translucent layers, which is largely created using print fabrics with the same predominate colors as the adjacent solids. The effect is boosted by the luminous silk. It's one thing when you see it up close, and a whole other thing when you step back and see the whole image. I think the maker was very clever, and had an incredible eye for color. It was worth the time to pull it out and get a better picture of it.