Vintage Indian Hatchet Quilt

This vintage Indian Hatchet quilt was made from one of the very first quilt tops I ever purchased.  It was one that Eli Leon was willing to sell back in the late 1980’s, before I had discovered that there were antique quilt and quilt top sellers at many major quilt shows.  Click here to see Eli’s great quilt site.

Indian Hatchet, date unknown
72″ x 83.5″
Photography by Sibila Savage

I love this quilt for so many reasons:

—it is so humble.

—it has lotsa red, duh.

—the simple block, repeated four times within the larger blocks, gives direction to the quilt.

—it is made from many, many scraps, including solids.

—it is wonky.  Your eyes are not fooling you;  this quilt is leaning to the side, not quite a rectangle.

Indian Hatchet, detail

The above detail shows the hand quilting done by Quilting Plus, which I thought this quilt deserved.  I think this may have been the first top that I had sewn by these wonderful stitchers.

I have another hypothesis about this quilt, even though I am not an expert in quilt history.  I think this top-maker increased her scrap collection by purchasing fabric scraps by the pound from a clothing manufacturer, a common practice in the 30’s and 40’s.  The crosshatch fabric, seen above in dark blue and red, appears elsewhere in the quilt in the green colorway as well.  Also, the fabric in the lower right of the detail is misprinted, and would have been discarded by a garment maker.   These clues lead me to think that this is not the fabric stash of one quilter.

Regardless of these “imperfections”, I love this quilt like crazy.