Description
Let’s Paint a Barn Quilt
Barn Quilts are a colorful and charming way to add color and design to an otherwise plan structure. They celebrate rural areas and agricultural traditions while also promoting travel to these regions.
Today, barn quilts can be found on barns, but also on other structures, including houses, garages, walls, fences, sheds, and more. These unique patterns often tell a story about local history or culture, making them significant symbols within communities.
Oklahoma is one of many states that have established new barn quilt trails. Several Oklahoma towns have listed their trails on social media, including Enid, Blackwell and also Frederick which sports Oklahoma’s largest barn quilt. Exploring these new quilt trails have become a favored activity for tourists and folks just wanting to take a nice leisurely drive.
Help us expand this wonderful tradition into our NE Oklahoma communities by painting a barn quilt of your very own!
Details
All supplies included. Just bring yourself.
Finished barn quilt will be 24″ x 24″.
INSTRUCTIONS:
- Review the available patterns and make a note of the ones you like.
- Once you’ve chosen your favorite pattern, right-click on the image and choose “Save image as” and save it to your computer. (optional – see note below)
- Click “Add To Cart” and check out to reserve your place in the class.
NOTE:
If you saved your image, you can print it out on regular printer paper and use it to create a color mock-up as a guide for how to paint your barn quilt during class. (Hint: Just use crayons or colored pencils to get an idea of the colors you want to use for your barn quilt. We can create the exact colors you want during class.)
Who:
Adults.
When:
January 18th
2:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Where:
The Artist’s Retreat
115 South 11th Street
Collinsville, Oklahoma 74021
History of Barn Quilts
Barn Quilts are a colorful and charming way to add color and design to an otherwise plan structure. It is an old tradition that is once again rising in popularity due to a grassroots art movement started by the late Donna Sue Groves in Adams County, Ohio in 2001. Groves’ quilt block was made to honor her late mother, a quilter, and to show appreciation for the barns that dot the country’s rural landscapes.
The origins of the American Barn Quilt date back nearly 300 years, coinsiding with the arrival of immigrants from Central Europe, specifically Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands.
Exactly how the tradition began and why remains a mystery, but it is commonly believed that barn quilts first appeared in Pennsylvania, and then spread throughout much of New England and the Midwest. Whether the immigrants brought the tradition with them or local residents devised barn quilts as a way for wayward travelers and non-English speaking immigrants to identify specific families or cross-roads is anybody’s guess.
Somewhere between the 1830s and 1840s, the creation of barn quilts emerged as a legitimate trade. The designs evolved as skilled artists blended folk art styles with the geometric designs found in popular quilt patterns like Snail Trail, Bear Claw, Mariners Compass, and Drunkard’s Path.
The popularity of barn quilts reached its height in the early 20th century and then began to fade, as they were overtaken for a more practical and profitable purpose: advertising. The colorful, charming quilts were slowly replaced by paid advertisements for products like Red Man Chewing Tobacco, Ceresota Flour, and Mail Pouch, each representing a nostalgic piece of American barn history in their own way.
Today, barn quilts are experiencing a resurgence in popularity. They can be found on barns and also other structures, including houses, garages, walls, fences, sheds, and more. Many of these contemporary barn quilts have been incorporated into quilt trails, which are maps detailing the quilt’s location, its significance, the farm’s name, and any other intriguing facts related to it.
States that have established quilt trails so far include Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Iowa, Michigan and more recently, Oklahoma. Exploring these new quilt trails has become a favored activity for tourists throughout America.
Do you want to schedule your own Craft Event? Just give us a call at (918) 335-8318 to get started!
Let us know if you have any questions at all! You can also reach out to us on Facebook!
Check our calendar for other events.
