I think most of us have a fondness and appreciation of old things. Especially things that are handmade. Years ago, I found this little piece of an old appliqued quilt in an antique mall:
It was in pretty good shape at the time. I brought it home, washed it and sewed a back on it. I stuffed it with polyester fiberfill and called it a pillow.
Over the years it of course has continued to age. Time is not always so kind to vintage textiles. It was time for another good cleaning and some repairs.
I washed by hand in my kitchen sink and replaced the missing french knot for the birds eye. It had a few tiny tears so I tucked a tiny piece of fusible web beneath the tears and ironed those in place.
Finally, I added a piece of lightweight iron-on interfacing to the back and squared it up.
I pulled a few of my 1930's reproduction prints out, soft shades of green and yellow:
I decided to do a border on the top and bottom of the vintage piece using strip quilting which I do on a foundation:
When I finished up the strip piecing, it kind of screamed "new fabric" against the vintage piece. I didn't want to "olden" it by tea dying or running through my washing machine a bunch of times so instead, I pulled out some of my cream colored laces and sewed strips of that down over or next to the seams:
This definitely softened the look of the new fabrics also adding a feminine quality to it. Once I completed that, I squared up my "sheet of fabric":
It was at this point that I realized I had made a much bigger piece than what I needed! I really just wanted about 3 inches on the top and the bottom of the vintage piece. That's okay though. I'll save the rest for something else.
Here is the finished pillow:
This now sits in my living room in an antique spindle chair that my father in law gave me.
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