Jamestown Quilters Guild’s work on display at Unison for April

The Jamestown Quilters Guild’s art is on display at Unison Bank for the month of April.

When women won the right to vote in 1921 technologies like electricity, gas, water lines, automobiles, phones and washing and sewing machines revolutionized the life.

With new products came new materials and the ’20’s and ’30’s saw a renewed interest in making quilts. Newspapers were running quilting columns and quilters were able to see pattern and fabric suggestions at the same time.

Even during the Great Depression many quilts were still intricate and sophisticated.

At the time quilt columns were the most popular feature in some major city newspapers.

Because materials for winning quilts were too expansive for many people, some people used printed feed and grain sacks.

Manufactors of feed, flour, salt and sugar bags began using cheap printed fabrics for their sacks. Bags were made of colorful, geometric and floral patterns, as well as solid colors. To encourage interest in the reuse of sacks, manufacturers designed them to become particular projects. For example, sacks intended to become pillowcases were imprinted with floral embroidery motifs. Others were made with quilt blocks printed on them while others had pre-printed patterns for hand puppets or stuffed animals, dolls and applique.

More information on quilting is available at the Jamestown Quilt Guild meetings at 7 p.m. on the third Thursday of the month at the James River Senior Center. The meeting is open to the public.

Tags: diversions, entertainment