Chrome Orange & Chrome Yellow

Mariner's Compass - 1880-1920

Many quilters working from about 1880-1920 used chrome colors as the neutral or the background in their quilts, a rather radical idea that very conservative women in Pennsylvania and the South found quite acceptable. Here are a few more pictures of quilts using yellows, some as accent, some as theme. The one below is from the Quilt Complex. I'm dating them fairly loosely from these snapshots.

Feathered Star 1880-1920

The two below are from dealer Laura Fisher

Princess Feather 1880-1920

Delectable Mountains 1860-1890

The rest I found in online auctions.

Star 1880-1910

Sugar Loaf 1880-1910

The block in this one is hard to figure out. Here's a diagram from my BlockBase software program.

For more about BlockBase click here:

http://www.electricquilt.com/Shop/BlockBase/BlockBase.asp

Pincushion or Orange Peel dated 1887

Ann Champion's blog shows a lot of antique quilts. She's fond of yellow.

http://annchampion.com/

Variation of the Whigs Defeat, 1850-1920

Monkey Wrench Variation 1890-1920 (It looks like a tiny Log Cabin in the corners of the block)

Log Cabin 1880-1920

Now go out and buy some yellow fabric. The boss reports that yellow doesn't sell as well as other colors--like blue, red or green. That's a shame.

Mystery Pattern: Swirl

For years the owner of this quilt and I have puzzled over the pattern.

She's drawn it up. She is going to make it, she says.

I am not.

But it does stick in my memory because it is so odd (and so difficult to draft---much less sew.)

I was looking at the pictures of cheddar quilts that Kathy Sullivan has collected and came across a cousin.

It's similar in its kind of yin-yang design but this doesn't repeat in the same complex way. (See below for the true Yin-Yang symbol.)

Neither are in my BlockBase computer program or Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns.

This is the closest I can find---but it's a distant cousin. Carrie Hall called it Spinning Ball.

The date on the red and white quilt is probably 1930-1950. That curvy ice-cream cone border makes me think it's after 1930 and so much Turkey red would not be likely after 1950.
The chrome orange block quilt is probably early 20th century, or possibly late 19th when so many Southerners made graphic designs with solid-colored cottons.

Thanks to Barbara and Kathy for the pictures.

Chrome Orange

This week the topic of my subscription email newsletter The Quilt Detective is chrome orange and chrome yellow. I have a disk, courtesy of Kathy Sullivan, that features quilts with chrome orange, what we today call cheddar. Kathy gave a Roundtable Session at the American Quilt Study Group meeting in October about the topic and she generously gave each participant a disk with the quilts in question. She gave me permission to use them.

Kathy collects cheddar quilts and quilts made in North Carolina, and many of these quilts fit into both categories.

This one is calling her name.

Another thing she collects is quilts and information about quilts made in this unusual pattern found in North Carolina. This one's appliqued to chrome yellow.

Thanks to Kathy for the entertainment.