Modern Materials: Ten Polyester Quilts

Bowties

The Modern Quilt Guild is holding its first ever national conference this week in Austin, Texas, and to celebrate, and as a tip of the hat to Roderick Kiracofe's exhibit of Modern Historical Quilts, I thought it would be fun to post ten of my 1970s polyester quilts. As Modern Quiltmaking gains momentum, there is growing interest in the roots of the movement. For me, all roads lead to the 1970s, a pivotal time in American quiltmaking, when modern materials such as double-knit polyesters were more readily available than cottons. Just like today's quilts, the polyester quilts of the 1970s display a fresh, innovative use of color.

String Quilt

Thirty-Six Patch

improvisational patchwork with applique

Crazy Blocks, with raw-edge applique

Four-Patch

Twenty-Five Patch

Octagons / Snowball Variation

Hexagon Diamonds

One-Patch Variation

The quilts of the 70s demonstrate a very distinct point of view. It's a bold, playful aesthetic immediately recognizable as representative of the time. The most memorable movements in quilt history have specific visual characteristics. Red and green quilts of Civil War, Victorian Crazy Quilts, and Easter egg colored quilts of the Depression era, are easily identified. In the future, when historians look back at the beginning of the 21st century, the will see many wonderful Modern quilts, immediately recognizable for their distinct point of view, just like the polyester quilts of the 70s.