Rebekka Seigel
Geometric Quilt Design Study Guide

History of American Quiltmaking

The art of quiltmaking came to America with the Dutch and English settlers. For many reasons the colonists arrived in America thinking that all of America was going to be like Virginia in the summer. From the Native Americans they learned certain ways to deal with the environment they found - how to build huts and what to do with corn. They still needed to make warm clothing and warm bed covers for the cold and long winters they had not expected.

Textiles is the manufacture of cloth and fabric. England made it against the law for the colonists to buy woven cloth from any country but England. It was also illegal for anyone trained in making textiles to go to live in America. Therefore, it took a long time for cloth to arrive in the colonies and what was available was terribly expensive. If a colonist tried to make a spinning wheel to make his own cloth from his sheep’s wool he could be sent to prison. If he was caught a second time the punishment could be that his hand was cut off.

In these early years life for the colonists was very hard. Clothing and bed covers were used till they fell apart. Then they were cut down for children and used again, and finally were cut up to save every usable scrap to sew together again for bedding. Quilts were stuffed with whatever was available - dried leaves, corn cobs, shreds of rags, letters or paper.

Life went on. Illegal tools for manufacturing textiles were built or smuggled into America. Sheep were raised for their wool and flax was planted. Flax is a plant whose stem is used to make a fabric called linen. It became so important to make cloth that by the year 1650 some colonies required every woman and child to spin a certain amount of flax each day. This was of course against the laws made by England. Quilts could be stuffed with fleece, which is the wool covering a sheep. This was warmer than rags or paper but when it was heated or damp gave off the smell of sheep.

Making quilts to keep the family warm was a necessary part of Colonial and Pioneer life. A number of quilts were needed for each bed and quilts were the only covers available for beds. People worked from dawn to dusk just to do the things necessary to survive. Making a quilt with a pattern was one of the only ways a woman could be creative. An individual’s bag of tiny fabric scraps was valuable and friends traded little scraps of fabric. These fabrics were carefully sorted into lights and darks so that the patterns created would look more attractive. Quilting bees or parties were a favorite activity of pioneer women, restricted as they were to the home and church. A wedding, a visit by a famous personage, and the arrival of a new minister were all occasions for making special “presentation” quilts. African-American women too contributed to this art form.

At first most quilts looked like crazy quilts. Then woman designed patterns to sew their fabrics together. These patterns were given names after the beauties of nature, patriotism, historical events, religious beliefs and even children’s games. The designs were passed down from mother to daughter, carried in covered wagons to be shared with new found friends, traded at fairs or given by a traveling peddler. As quilt patterns spread westward with the expansion of the nation or as they were colored in colored in different ways, the names of the patterns were often changed to match the new surroundings. For example, a pattern known as DUCK FOOT IN THE MUD in New York State was known at the same time as HAND OF FRIENDSHIP in Pennsylvania and as BEAR’S PAW in Ohio which was at that time the frontier.

Beautiful quilt designs were developed and passed along from generation to generation, some examples ending up in museum collections, a celebration of women’s contributions to the arts over the years. Today quiltmaking is both a popular hobby and a medium of expression for professional artists and lives on tracing it’s roots back to those original settlers in America.

Mathematics of Quilt Designs

Symmetry

The square is the basic shape for quilt making. To study the symmetry of a square ask each student to label the corners of a paper square consecutively A,B,C,D. To test for LINE SYMMETRY, ask the students to fold the square so that one half matches the other half. This fold line is called an AXIS OF SYMMETRY. Along how many lines can the square be folded so that one half matches the other half? The square has 4 axes of symmetry.

To test for ROTATIONAL SYMMETRY, the student traces the square on a piece of paper and labels the corners to match. Placing a pencil point or finger on the center of both squares (one on top of the other), the student rotates the free square until it matches the traced square. The process continues until the free square is back to the original position. The square has TURN or ROTATIONAL SYMMETRY of order four because it matches the traced square in 4 different positions as it turns.

Exercise in symmetry

Color this pattern in different ways so that it has:
exactly 1 line of symmetry
exactly 2 lines of symmetry
exactly 4 lines of symmetry
rotational but not line symmetry
Color Theory and Quiltmaking


The Color Wheel

The color wheel is the basic way to organize colors.

Primary Colors: These are the first 3 colors of the color wheel: red, yellow and blue.
It is from these 3 colors that all the other colors are mixed. The 3 primary colors cannot be made by mixing.

Secondary Colors: The 3 secondary colors are made by mixing 2 primary colors.
Yellow + Blue = Green
Yellow + Red = Orange
Blue + Red = Purple


Tertiary Colors: The colors made by combining primary and secondary colors are called tertiary colors. The 6 tertiary colors are made by combining a primary color and the secondary color next to it on the color wheel.
Red + Orange = Red-Orange
Red + Purple = Red-Purple
Yellow + Orange = Yellow-Orange
Yellow + Green = Yellow-Green
Blue + Green = Blue-Green
Blue + Purple = Blue-Purple


Complimentary Colors: The color opposite a color on the the color wheel is its compliment. To compliment something means to finish it. Mixed together, 2 complimentary colors always make a gray. Each color has only one compliment.
The compliment of Yellow is Purple.
What is the compliment of blue?
What is the compliment of red?


Tints and Shades: The colors on our color wheel are pure. No black or white has been added. We can take any of these colors and make it darker or lighter by adding black or white. If we add white it is called a tint. If we add black to the color the result is called a shade.

Here is a color wheel for you to color.


Principles of Color

Human beings understand what color is because what we see is interpreted by both the eye and the brain. The eye and the brain give each color meaning by comparing one color to another. There are an infinite number of colors. One person’s vision and interpretation may be different from someone else’s.

1. In square #1, color A white and color B black.
   In square #2, do leave both squares white.
   
   Square #1 Square #2
   
   In which square does the small white square look the largest?
   Explanation: A white square on a black background will look larger than a white square of the same size on a white background.
   
   
2. In square #3, color E light gray and color F white.
   In square #4, color G light gray and color H black.
   
   Square #3 Square #4
   
   Explanation: A light gray square looks dark on a white background. The same light gray square looks light on a black background.
   
   A color is never seen by itself. The way it seems changes depending on what color is next to it. The squares below are identical in size, but depending on how we color them, the squares will appear different. The same red color may look bright next to one color and quiet when surrounded by another.
   
   
3. In squares #5, #6, #7 and #8, color I red. In square #5, color J and K orange. In square #6, color L and M dark green. In square #7, color N and O turquoise. In square #8, color P and Q hot pink.
   
   Square #5 Square #6
   
   Square #7 Square #8 Questions:
   
   1. In which square does the red look largest?
   2. In which square does the red look smallest?
   3. In which square does the red look darkest?
   4. In which square does the red look brightest?
   5. Which color combination do you like best?
   6. Which color combination do you hate?

Color and Quilt Block Patterns

The pattern on the next 2 pages is called the “Simple Star” or the “Nine-Patch Star”. We are going to explore color theory by coloring each star a different way. you will make your own conclusions about which color combinations work best because color is subjective. We do not all see color the same way.

1. Color #1 using only black and gray.
2. Color #2 reversing the black and the purple.
3. Select 2 different shades of blue. Color #3 using only these 2 colors.
4. Color #4 reversing the same 2 shades of blue.
5. Color #5 using 3 different shades of blue.
6. How many squares and triangles are there in the “Simple Star” block? Close your eyes and pick out a crayon to color in the first square in the top left. Do this 17 more times until you have colored in each shape. If you pick the same color more than once, you should use it again.
7. Look at the color wheel you made. Color #7 using the 3 primary colors.
8. Using the 3 primary colors again, color #8 in a different way.
9. Color #9 using the 3 secondary colors.
10. Color #10 with a combination of a primary color, the secondary color next to it and the tertiary color between them. For example, use blue, green and blue-green.
11. Choose one pair of complimentary colors and color #11.
12. Color #12 anyway you like.