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The art of American quiltmaking is a melting pot of ideas and techniques. Those of us who sew and quilt might find that over the years our techniques evolve and our tastes change. One American quiltmaking group has been oblivious to change. Their bold use of color with geometric shapes has stayed steadfast while influencing every generation of quilters. Our guest today is one of those so influenced. Welcome back my friend Klaudeen Hansen a historian of Amish quilting a prolific quilter, and teacher. Klaudeen, we're going to learn today about the traditional "Diamond in the Square" Amish quilt design. Yes, the Amish quilt design called "Diamond in a Square" is sometimes called "Square in a Square." To the Amish, since the block is set on point it is called the "Diamond in a Square." It's one of the most common of the Amish patterns. The quiltmakers may wear plain clothes yet their bed quilts are anything but plain. "Amish Quilt Stories and Techniques" that's what's coming up next on Sewing with Nancy! Sewing with Nancy TV's longest-airing sewing and quilting program with Nancy Zieman is made possible by Baby Lock a complete line of sewing, quilting and embroidery machines and sergers. Baby Lock, for the love of sewing. Madeira, specializing in embroidery, quilting and special effect threads because creativity is never black and white. Koala Sewing Cabinets hand built in the USA by American craftsmen customized for you. Clover makers of sewing, knitting, quilting and embroidery products for over 25 years. Experience the Clover difference. Amazing Designs and Klass needles. During this series on "Amish Quilt Stories Techniques" the stories that these quilts tell that Klaudeen has learned really tell about the simplicity of life, but beauty and color. The color is a very interesting part of the Amish quilts. This is slightly duller than some of the others. It was more Pennsylvania Amish colors and as the Amish moved west, the colors got brighter. However, they never started using the oranges, the yellow, and the gold part of the color wheel. Because that is considered too bright. Yes, it is. So even though these color combinations made of remnants of fabrics are very bold you don't see any of the orange and yellow in their personal quiltmaking. Now, the "Square in the Square" or the "Diamond in the Square" as it is called in that culture you made a miniature in all those areas because these quilts hung in a special exhibit. Yes, they did. They were all exhibited at the American embassy in Oslo Norway during the Olympics in Lillehammer. So, this was the art exhibit that was spread out throughout the building. You chose to make a true "Diamond in a Square" but it is not a square. It's not a square. It was a fun quilt to make but it was a little bit of a surprise when it was done. Another Amish design has what we would call a "Trip Around the World Design" with the small little squares. This one also illustrates how happy the "Diamond in a Square" makes the Amish culture. They used the "Diamond in a Square" idea in making things that aren't actually the "Diamond in a Square" quilt. The narrow inner border and the wide outer border are characteristic techniques. Now the large quilt behind us is still another variation of the theme. It has that Diamond in a Square look but this one is pieced in mini squares in itself and then enhanced with curves in the hand quilting. As you look at the areas that are solid fabric they have been heavily hand quilted. We are not going to hand quilt today because, Klaudeen, we are not expert hand quilters. No, I have been fortunate to have students and friends who helped with the hand quilting. That is very typical in the Amish culture too, that they would have friends help with their hand quilting. So some may be pieced by piecing experts and others hand quilters. Here we have one more example of the Diamond in a Square with a Lone Star design in the middle. The narrow border and the wide outer border are the two characteristics that make it still in the Amish culture. Another thing to point out is that borders are not necessarily mitered. No, in the Amish culture that is considered a waste of fabric, so almost all of the borders are not mitered although the corner square is used quite frequently. Even this kind of subtle color with the vibrant really works well together. Now there was a postage stamp that featured a Diamond in the Square Amish design and we can get a close-up of this stamp. This is what you made the miniature of. You make all your quilts in miniature. They are easier to handle and they are so bright that it is so hard to decorate with a large quilt. That stamp has a great story in that the original quilt is in the Museum of Quilts and Textiles in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Then the stamp was widely used throughout everywhere shortly before Christmas so there were lots of these stamps out. That's what made me decide to make a miniature quilt very much like the stamp. To point out the way an Amish quilter would start with this they would not necessarily cut all their pieces to begin with. No, they don't. They build their quilts from the center out. So, the first thing that would happen is the quiltmaker would decide on a stencil that she likes and the stencil design would then be measured. That would determine the size of the center square. So, where you start, a bigger stencil a bigger square in the middle. a small stencil, a small square in the middle. I like that rationale. You don't have to think too hard. A very practical approach. The color combination is phenomenal. So, we're going to put together and show how this quilt was created in miniature. All the instructions and sizes will be in the book that accompanies today's program. So, we have a square. We started out with a 5" square which is what this stencil fits on. We surrounded that 5" square with short strips of the purple and the longer strips of the purple to make the framed effect. Once the purple strips are on then it is time to add the black triangles. This was two 6" squares that I cut in half diagonally and then added to each of the sides. The interesting thing about this is that those of you who are quilters see that this is really oversized. Yes, it is. That is again that idea of building the quilt from the middle out so that the measurements are not important. What's important is that the end result ends up square. Because generally when we cut a triangle square we would have just a 1/4" seam allowance and start sewing where the V-shapes go. If we did that here we would sew off more than we needed to. So you just use 1/4" seam allowances and then cut off just chunk that off. That's the way you learn. That's the practical approach that the Amish ladies do. They would cut this side before they added the other two triangles which would then be added on these two sides and your end product would end up looking like this. It is bigger than what you need. It is bigger than what you need. This Diamond in a Square can float, and that is leave a little black showing on all four sides or we can do it in a more precise manner and use a ruler to cut the corners so that there is just 1/4" on all four sides. It is important at this stage to think about the carpentry skills that the Amish have observed and know about so we are assured that the quilt is actually square. Then we added smaller inner borders and then larger outer borders. It's just a piecing process. Just whatever the size they should make. It is very logical, straightforward process and a very exciting process to do. Perhaps that's why the Diamond in a Square is used in so many other quilts as a starting point for the design element. So the quilting or the piecing is not difficult. It just happens as it is built but the design is certainly bold and attractive. A fascinating aspect about studying quilt history is to discover the association between the name of the blocks and the lives of the women who made them. So it will come as no surprise that this Amish Quilt design is called "Hole in the Barn Door." Made with templates, the striking block pattern sewn with high-contrast colors makes this an appealing design whether your lifestyle is urban, suburban, or rural. All of the quilts that you've seen in this series Klaudeen has made are miniatures. An Amish quiltmaker would have made this very large. Yes, the blocks would be at least 12" square not the small ones that we're seeing in this quilt. They are not as exacting on fabrics as maybe some of our contemporaries are. They use a variety of fabric, as long as it conforms to their idea of solid colors. So, we have some polished cotton. You can see the chintz or polished cotton has a little bit more shine than what's incorporated as well as poly cotton or cotton. Yes, color is more important than fabric style. Absolutely. The color makes the quilt, and the Amish use color really in a unique way. This one has the added attraction of an inner border that's a very unusual color. It does not go with any of the colors that are in there= and that is an Amish technique that I saw being used on many of the antique quilts. That inner border was always the surprise when I studied these quilts. Often the fabrics are from remnants of sewing clothes. So a lot of farmers wear this in the fields little boys are known to wear the turquoise color and then little girls... Here are the squares in the middle are the holes left over from the barn door. It gives a little balance to this particular piece. It certainly does. Now, we just did the Diamond in the Square and we just learned that they started with a square of fabric that met with the stencil size but now the stencils are templates now, I should say. Yes, this one is made from templates. The templates in the Amish culture might have been wood or sheet metal but today when you visit the Amish stores you will find the usual acrylic plastic templates that are used by lots of other quiltmakers. The process of tracing around on the dark colored fabric does require a light marker. But, then they can proceed to cut with the rotary cutter or with a scissors the pieces for this quilt. I asked you if you noticed in your research if a lot of grain was followed in some of the quilts and we're a little bit more particular. Yes, the grain line wasn't quite as big of an issue because they are working with scraps often scraps from clothing and perhaps they are odd pieces to begin with. Sure. So the three template styles that are included for the Hole in the Barn Door you can see would be a square, a triangle as well as a rectangle shape. We just put the marks on the templates to find the grain line. It is hard to break old habits for me. Then the piecing would not be oversized because these are the templates. So there are four half-square triangles put together and the seamstress has adapted some western style techniques. Yes, they have. Chain piecing works really well for everyone who is using a sewing machine, whether the sewing machine is electric or manual. So one of each color goes together to create the half-square triangles to be a full triangle, and then the bars as you can see, are the black and a color. The layout is here. It is constructed in rows. I am peeling back your quilt and I am going to lay out the four blocks plus the holes in the barn door right in the middle as a 9-patch. You can see how this is starting to get the look that you have. We didn't use the same colors but then counterbalanced with the squares. So, this just gives you a simple idea of the Hole in the Barn door. It has another common name. Yes, it does. It is also called "Churn Dash" quite often. It is a derivative of that butter churn that would be in use in some of the Amish homes. So you can see that this has an interesting story as well as technique. Inspired by an Amish Crazy Quilt made in Illinois, Klaudeen created her own interpretation in miniature called a "9-Patch Shuffle." Like most quilters around the world Amish quilters use scraps of fabric that are too small for other quilting projects to create a crazy quilt. Here's where the similarities stop. Unlike traditional crazy-quilted blocks, restraint is used! Amish quilters enhance the block with decorative quilting not elaborate decorative embroidery stitches. As you see this quilt in miniature you will see that there are nine colors but Klaudeen, you took a little sidetrack. You didn't use the traditional scraps. I used traditional colors, but I didn't use anything that remotely resembled traditional technique. I used something new and fun called the "9-Patch Shuffle." What I have here is a stack of nine different squares, and each one of the squares is 9". Then I am going to randomly cut this into what we would call a traditional 9-patch. Only, not so traditional once you see where the cuts are going. When I start the cuts, I just put the ruler on someplace. It doesn't make a lot of difference. But, watch where you start. I'm going to start in the middle because this is a thick stack of fabric and I want to make sure that they don't shift when I am working. Once these cuts are in then I need to make the cross cuts. Just sort of put it there and make these cross cuts. Now, you're kind of cutting on an angle. Oh, I cut at a very odd angle here so that we can see what I am doing. I am not cutting as successfully as I would like to be. However, those little variations will get hidden in the seams. So, now we have a very unusual-looking 9-patch. We are going to separate these sections but we are going to keep them in order of where they were placed while I was cutting them. So we will just separate the rows a little bit so that we know where they are but we will leave them in their original position. Now, you are going to be cutting at home on a flat surface, not on an angle. I think you will be more successful than I was today. Now we are going to do the shuffle. I am going to start on one corner and I'm going to pick the top piece off and I'm going to put it on the bottom. The next stack I'm going to take the top two pieces off and I'm going to put those on the bottom. The next stack I am going to take the top three pieces off and move those to the bottom. I'll bet you can tell me how many to move on stack number four? Yes, we are quick learners, Klaudeen. Every stack we move one more, shuffle one more. If you get interrupted, it's not too hard to figure out where you were. I did one, two, three, four, and I'm on five now. So one can get back to this without making mistakes. There we go. This is going to be six. So there'll be nine different blocks created from this shuffling system. The shuffling is fun to do because it brings up a surprise every time you move a piece of fabric. You know you're done when every piece of fabric facing you is a different color. Notice that I did absolutely nothing to stack number nine. So they are all different pieces. We did another shuffle and placed it on a cutting mat or another piece of fabric and then placed it next to your sewing machine. Here I am sewing block number one to block number two. After doing that I would add the third block. You create rows, three rows. This is a 9-patch, remember? For those of you who are quilting we have a 9-patch hidden underneath here but we have three different rows that have been put together. Then we would sew the rows together. Klaudeen, you have... Just flip this around so you have a place to cut. Here is one that is totally stitched together. The beauty of this is you don't have to match anything. If they match, that is a surprise. Yes, but it is almost better if they don't because it looks more like a real Crazy Quilt. It would also not be a surprise to have things not meet at the outside edges because of the odd angles that everything is cut. So then we are going to take a ruler and I just chose a 6-1/2" square. I didn't want the quilt to get really big. You can decide where to place it. You do have some options. You can see as I move the ruler around that one could emphasize or almost eliminate one of the colors on the block. Then after squaring it you now have nine blocks or have to square nine blocks and put them together with sashing. You get nine whether you want nine or not so it really is the 9-patch Shuffle. So, our final Amish quilt technique and story is that we have taken a detour onto a modern road, to a highway to do the shuffle, 9-patch Shuffle, using these great colors, great techniques and story. Klaudeen, thank you. What great designs we have! During "Nancy's Corner" today you are going to hear the second part of Quilters Without Borders, an interesting story from our guest who is piecing together a better future for Mongolian women because she taught them how to quilt. I'd like you to meet again Maggie Ball. Maggie is from Seattle, originally from England, but now from Seattle. Maggie, you taught women in Mongolia starting in 2004, basic quilting techniques. That's right. Quilting is a new activity there but very appropriate because the women are very good seamstresses and they have things they can recycle. So I taught them how to piece the lzii symbol, which is a traditional Mongolian symbol. Here they have made many products that have this symbol on. You can also see on the crib quilt a larger version of this. They make full-size quilts with many lziis, as well. Mongolian quilters have kind of developed this symbol as their little trademark and the tourists love it and they will purchase these products from the women which is great. Perhaps some of you were with us during our first interview with Maggie how she single handedly taught this group of women in Mongolia how to quilt. They have used this skill as a community to get together to have support system and to earn money. That's right. There are both social and economic benefits. I am just stunned and awed by the work they are doing now producing beautiful silk pieces, expanding on this lzii pattern. You taught them this basic pattern, as seen on the tote but here this kind of knocks your socks off. It's spectacular. Absolutely, and they obtain the silk locally it is Chinese silk which they can get in the market. So they can use that. In order for these women to have a place to gather to sell, to work together, they came to you and said. "Okay Maggie, you taught us how to quilt. Now we need a place to have our own center." They had a rented center and there were a variety of problems with the couple of different centers they had. So, it was time to find a permanent facility so I headed a fund raising campaign. My church, St. Barnabas Episcopal Church on Bainbridge Island hosted that campaign so that we had a nonprofit organization to which people could donate. We did all kinds of fund raising events including reaching out to quilt guilds around the nation. Selling some of the beautiful handiwork of the Mongolian women? Yes, and when I lecture and teach I tell the quilters about this program. We also did all kinds of local fund raising events in our community on Bainbridge Island and had very generous support from the parishioners of the church and our local members. You raised $82,000, and here is the center. Yes, and this summer I was able to go back and visit the new center and it was absolutely thrilling to see it. They now have a shop front and they have a classroom and a small office. It's on a busy main street close to the center of town. The women can get there easily by public transport. The tourists can come to the shop and it was thrilling to see that. You have to be very proud of your work, very proud. Also what they have done with your basic instruction because this piece, if we hold this up this is so stunning. Is that same lzii design, but expanded. Yes, those under/over woven patterns can be expanded out into pretty complex designs and the women themselves are working out how to piece these. You have another design of a landscape that they did. Yes, they are doing beautiful applique pieces now. They are making Mongolian landscapes showing traditional lifestyle in Mongolia with the ger, the Mongolia yurt and the animals. This is a tourist souvenir showing the yurt. If you can see, this is where you would have your lzii design right on the door, as they would have in Mongolia. Yes, it is painted on the wooden door to bring long life and prosperity to the people who live there. Maggie, you have done a remarkable thing from an email you received in 2003 asking for help to teach women in Mongolia to quilt to help fundraise a community center. Amazing. Keep up the great work. Thank you, Nancy. Thank you for joining us on Sewing With Nancy. If you would like to learn more about Quilters Without Borders you can go to sewingwithnancy.com under "Nancy's Corner" and the 2300 series. You can click and find information about Maggie Ball and the website that will lead you to learning more about this. I'd also say a special thanks to Klaudeen Hansen for being with us during the two-part series "Amish Quilt Stories and Techniques." Through this series we have learned from Mongolian women from Amish women, from women across the world that quilts and threads tie us together. Thanks for joining us, bye for now. Nancy and Klaudeen Hansen have written a fully illustrated book entitled "Amish Quilt Stories & Techniques" which includes all the information from this two-part series. It's $14.99, plus shipping and handling! To order the book, call 800.336.8373 or visit our website at sewingwithnancy.com/2323. Order Item Number BK2323 "Amish Quilt Stories & Techniques." Credit Card orders only. 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