Friday, August 5, 2011

The Humble T Shirt Quilt's Place In History

I am very fond of T shirt quilts. They are so personal, a collection of a hobby, such as car shows in the quilt above, high school memories, vacations, or sports. Wasn’t it just natural to make these collections of clothing into a quilt, just like our great grandmothers used precious scraps of clothing while piecing quilts in prior generations? The T shirt quilt is so well known toeven non crafty people, a gift enjoyed equally by males and females, young and old.






T shirt quilts can be taken on by those who barely know how to sew with their simple straight lines, large pieces, and usually only one or two coordinating fabric choices. And yet they offer a chance to be creative, choosing or finding just the perfect coordinating fabric like the car fabric for the car show quilt, or the dog paw print fabric for the high school bulldogs team shirts, or bicycles on the bike ride shirts.I have made a t shirt quilt for my daughter with pictures from her senior year in high school scanned and transferred onto fabric and added as the corner stones and stars in the quilt.
As quilter’s we love to look at antique quilts and we all hope our quilt’s make it to future generations to be loved and treasured. Material culture is a term that refers to the relationship between artifacts and social relations. The study of material objects (material as in items - not fabric) to get a historical look at past societies. I think the T shirt quilts we are making now will tell future generations more about our current society than any other quilts we are currently making.They are the bread and butter of my little long arm quilting business and I love seeing the different T shirt collections that come under my needle.
Happy Stitching All

2 comments:

  1. Fun! Fun! Fun! I have one in the works for my son, but am waiting for more shirts:)

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  2. I agree, they will tell stories to those in the future :0) I've never made one, probably never will but they are fun to look at.

    Crispy

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