The Spirit of Welsh Quilting

I am now going to bang the drum a little, because I have a passion I want to share with you.

In country areas of 19th century Wales quilting was an organic process and perfection was not the goal.  Those who could afford to employ a quilter paid them per quilt and not for their time spent quilting.  Quilters therefore had to be very practical and when they made a mistake they did not waste time unpicking but just kept going and disguised inconsistencies within their subsequent patterning.  This gave their work a vitality that sets it apart, as no two quilts were ever alike.

I really admire this approach and try to follow it myself.  I prefer it to the way quilting developed in 20th century when perfection became the goal.  When classes and competitions seem to iron out inconsistencies and the quilts made, though beautiful became, in my opinion, rather soulless.  

Of course it had to be this way because the Rural Industries Bureau was promoting and helping to sell quilts in London galleries, so the idiosyncratic style of earlier quilters would not have been acceptable.  We don't have these pressures now as most of us quilt because we enjoy it, so unless we want to win a prize, we are free to return to the traditional organic approach of the 19th century.

 There is so much more to quilting the Welsh way than by using a light box to trace a printed pattern onto cloth and then painstakingly follow the drawn lines with quilting stitches!  True Welsh quilting requires imagination and innovation for the quilter to imprint her personality upon the cloth. 

Just look at this picture to see how wonderfully free the quilting was - look how the leaves are so wobbly and the spirals aren't all even -

 This quilt wouldn't win a rosette today because now quilting is judged differently.  Are we wrong in our values?  What do you think?  

This quilt is in the Jen Jones Collection, thank you Jen for allowing me to photograph it and share it with others.