$949.00
This Mariner’s Postage Stamp Quilt displays a stunning Mariner’s Compass in the center of the Postage Stamp pattern. The lovely navy, red, and green fabrics compose an artful bed quilt. The quilt is generous enough in length so that one can use a simple pillow tuck rather than pillow shams. The generous width gives a drop measurement of 17 inches per side. This quilt was hand-stitched using 238 yards of thread and fits a king-size bed.
Measures 112″ wide x 116″ long.
Homemade quilts combine the warmth of a bed cover with a unique story told by the quilters from Lancaster County, PA. Every homemade quilt is as unique as the family, busy mother or Amish ladies group who uses a needle and thimble to thread stitch on the quilt. Some quilts involve hundreds of hours and thousands of stitches to create a unique patchwork quilt that will last for generations.
When you peruse our HOMEMADE QUILTS you are shopping for an item that tells a story and adds meaning to your bedroom! Discover more about our unique patchwork quilts and the stories behind them…
We have a lot of quilts! Want to see a gallery of the major patterns? Checkout our Common Amish Quilt Patterns.
The Mariner’s Compass quilt pattern has been known and loved among dedicated quilters, only the best of whom could manage the intricacies of stitching the precise points of the compass or star, as it was variously known. While most early quilts were simple, the Mariner’s Compass quilt was complex, and often was reserved for special occasions.
While other patterns may suggest a star pattern, the Mariner’s Compass name specifically refers to quilts in which the star radiates from a circular center. The roots of this pattern are hard to trace. Barbara Brackman writes of the many names used for this pattern, including The Explosion, the Merry Go Round, the Rolling Pinwheel, the Slashed Star–even Chips and Whetstones. Each name suggests what quilters saw as they stitched their quilt tops!
Quilt pattern books began to use the Mariner’s Compass name, widely accepted today, around the 1960s; its first published use was in 1929. Various historians, knowing the pattern’s popularity in the American northeast, have suggested that seafaring folk saw the compass rose on nautical maps and reproduced it on their blankets. The Pennsylvania Germans picked it up, adding brighter colors and patterns.
Each and every step of the quilt-making process needs a particular lady's proficiency. Each of our ladies focuses on either assembling or quilting. Therefore, a minimum of 2 ladies are associated with making each quilt. The ladies who sew the tops together specialize in assembling certain quilt patterns. Considering that each quilter's stitches vary, just one lady does the quilting per quilt. This system permits each lady to end up being a professional in her field.
Called a “charm” quilt in the late 19th century, young women collected hundreds of different fabrics from their family and friends. Perhaps if they collected 999 different squares, their true love would bring them the thousandth–and their happily-ever-after dream, too. One quilting blogger speculates that collecting these fabrics may have given girls opportunities to ask their love interest for a contribution!
The scrap quilt has also been called a “beggar” quilt, referring to quilters asking each other for contributions to their projects. Trying to put together a bedspread without repeating every fabric, they also called the quilts “odd feller” quilts–every piece was an odd feller. Some families recall their mother repeating one square, however, so that a child sick in bed might be entertained looking for the matching patches.
Still another name scrap quilts went by is the “postage stamp” quilt, so called because quilters would use their tiniest scraps, sometimes no bigger than a postage stamp. Perhaps the original motivation was not wasting the smallest piece (historians recall the scarcity of the Great Depression in this), but it also became a challenge at some point. Quilters would collect thousands of pieces to compete with each other in making stitched masterpieces.
The term handmade is commonly utilized to define crafts created by a craftsman as opposed to a factory. Since it is not mass-produced, each handmade quilt is one-of-a-kind. Not all the sewing in a handcrafted quilt is done by hand. Just as the woodcrafter makes use of mechanical tools to create his craftsmanship, our seamstresses make use of various devices to craft these quilts. The seamstress cuts her items with a rotary blade knife and stitch them together on the sewing machine. The quilter functions with only needle, thimble, as well as thread to quilt hundreds of little stitches throughout the quilt. Handmade is a gift: it is the gift of time and also talent to develop a thing distinctly for you.