My hiatus from tatting has included reading lots of books including some about quilts. I get quilts as something that uses up scraps and usable pieces of fabric from worn out garments. I get quilts that are one of a kind works of art to be displayed. I get appliqued quilts. I get making quilts as a relaxing sewing outlet. It's the other 90% that I don't get.
Maybe it's because getting neat precise points while machine sewing has always been an issue for me. I can do anything with needle and thread and for several years I made all my dresses. Points where things had to meet were always hand sewn first because just throwing pinned together pieces on the sewing machine never gave the results I wanted.
How is it that a leisure art based on cutting up perfectly good sheets of fabric and sewing it together again to make a sheet can be an industry? How can tatting do the same thing?
Inquiring minds want to know.
My mom's friend used to say the same thing about cutting big pieces of cloth into little pieces of cloth to sew back together into big pieces of cloth. I've done it myself a number of times and have the materials here right now to make one that will be a souvenir of a trip I and my DH took to Yellowstone. I can't help with the logic- there's just something magic about creating something beautiful with my own two hands. I can't seem to do it in other ways so I do it with thread and some variation on a needle.
ReplyDeletei agree with the cutting-up-then-sewing-back-together sentiment! it makes more sense to make quilts out of left overs and "throw-aways".
ReplyDeleteas for the difference in appeal... i think that the puzzle aspect is as appealing as the actual sewing. the same can be said for tatting, but quilting covers more area more quickly, and is ultimately more practical.
after all, we don't "need" doilies and antimacassars any more, but a nice warm quilt is always useful.
tatting also has a reputation as being difficult to learn, which doesn't help!
technically speaking, quilting is the action of putting the top layer, the batting, and the back together... piecing is cutting up and sewing back together. I think people do it because a pattern is more interesting than a flat sheet of material, just the same how string is made more interesting when tatted :)
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