The Quilt Garden

The Quilt Garden. North Carolina Arboretum. This central garden pays homage to North Carolina's long history of quilting. The flowers and plants represent some of the most popular traditional block patterns used in Appalachian quilts., The garden uses a technique called tessellation (tess-eh-LAY-shun). Tessellation evolved from broderie perse (BRO-der-ee pairs), or "Persian embroidery," which involves cutting and piecing one cloth or motif onto another. Many quilt designs use simple shapes to form more complex patterns. Changing the color or print of these shapes changes the look of the pattern., Every year, we choose one overall pattern for this garden, and tessellate it by planting different flowers in the pattern at three times during the growing season. We've featured block patterns such as Log Cabin, Flower Basket, Bow Tie, Grandma's Fan, Double Wedding Ring and Variable Star (illustrated above)., Quilting in North Carolina. Most North Carolina quilts produced in the 19th and 20th centuries were simple and useful , not the elaborate artworks produced by wealthy women in America's cities during the same period. By 1860, urban dwellers in other states considered quilting a nostalgic craft, but for North Carolinians, scrap quilting remained a necessity until after World War II., There were many reasons for this. Women in rural North Carolina were just too busy getting by to be fussy. They lived in isolated settlements, far from the railroads that could have brought them interesting fabrics and design ideas, and they were poor, due to an underdeveloped economy dominated by tobacco., So they made do, and used , and reused , the wool and cotton fabrics they produced themselves. They recycled worn quilts into new ones or used them as batting (the soft filling inside a quilt). When they couldn't repair or remake a quilt, they used it for insulation in walls and even around canned goods in pantries and cellars!, Quilting went out of vogue in most parts of the U.S. by the 1940s, and even declined a bit in North Carolina as ready-made blankets became available., But a spark endured, and grew, and with the bicentennial in 1976 quilting was back bigger than ever before. For North Carolinians, quilting finally had moved from a necessity to a treasured craft form., [inset illustration captions] , . Flower Basket Design , . “Tree of Life” , a common example of Broderie perse , . Log Cabin Design , . Grandma’s Fan Design