Vintage Treasures

 Last year I was approached by a friend of ours whether I could help restore/repair three quilts his grandmother had made. I don't know exactly how old these quilts are, but the lady was born in 1905 so I guess they are approaching 100 years old.

I have never restored or repaired quilts before, so I was a little hesitant in accepting this task, but finally said yes.

The quilts showed different stages of wear and tear.

The first quilt was in the best condition, though the fabrics were faded a lot. The size of the quilt was 46.5" x 75". The edges were very flimsy and needed to be repaired. 

My local quilt store had a French General solid from Moda in a beige color that was almost the same color as the original binding, so I bought that for all three quilts.

The blue background fabric in quilt number two showed minimal fading, but some of the stars were very pale. The size of this one was 59" x 76.5". As you clearly can see from this picture the edges are flimsy and worn and the blue fabric had holes around the edges.

The third quilt was the biggest one, original size 63" x 81", and very colorful. All hand pieced and hand quilted. This one was most worn of the three, some of the fabrics in the star were completely worn off. In addition, the yellow fabric "extension" on top and bottom were worn to pieces and had to go.

 

A closeup of some of the most worn blocks. A lot of the fabrics couldn't take the daily wear and tear.

I searched my stash for replacement fabrics, and also bought some vintage looking fabrics from my LQS. This became a big hand sewing project; ripping out single diamond and square pieces, adding batting pieces where I had to, hand sewing new shapes into the blocks, and finally hand quilting the repaired blocks.

The largest quilt took me almost a month to hand stitch, while repairing one block I often found another next to it that had to be fixed.

Finally all the quilts are restored, and are again heirlooms that can be handled with care. Lucky great-grandchildren who will inherit these beautiful quilts!

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 Below are the restored quilts in all their glory:

The first one got a new binding and some holes were mended.

For the second quilt I cut off some of the most worn blue fabric on the edges, and added a new binding. The resulting length was reduced to 70".

The third quilt got a completely refreshed look with the star blocks repaired and a new binding. My opinion is that it also looks a lot better without the yellow fabric extension on top and bottom. Finished dimension is 63" x 72.5".

This quilt restoration project was a great experience, and I am proud of the result.