Taking Care of Old Quilts: A New Resource

Have you ever met Ann Wasserman, or heard her speak about quilt history or restoration?  She has more experience in working with old quilts than anyone I know! She has been restoring them for 30 years.  What a coincidence that she should publish her book, at the same time I am restoring my red and green tulip quilt!

This is the cover of Ann's book.

Ask your local quilt shop to order it for you, or better yet, have Ann sign one for you by ordering it at
http://www.annquilts.com/book.html. 

This book is packed with ideas and photos of how to preserve a quilt. You will learn from an expert.  There are 106 pages, a color cover, and some color pages within. She mentions that when restoring a quilt, do as little as possible! Ann has done an extremely thorough job in giving the reader many options on how to handle repairs. The illustrations and photos are carefully detailed so her techniques are easy to understand. 

 Here are some of the topics she includes in the book:

• Supplies, basics and fabrics
• Types of stitches, many illustrations on how to make them
• Varieties of holes, tears, and slits (who knew there were so many different sizes and shapes?)
• How and why to repair, patch, applique, reverse applique (how to tackle the tricky ones)
• Hand, machine work
• Cleaning, washing, spot cleaning, why not, drying flat
• Display
• Storing
• Musty odors
• Record keeping
• Supplier list
• Bibliography 

The above list is brief, the book includes too many subjects to mention here.  You will see that she has found all of these issues in her historic restorations and knows just how to handle them.  If you want to work with old quilts and textiles, this book is a must read for you. Put this on your Christmas list.

Ann Fahl