What’s a barn quilt? A quilt sewn to hang in a barn? No. They are boards painted to look like quilts and hung outside of barns and houses. When I heard about this from a fellow Camera Totin’ Tuesday member, I was curious. I found that the practice is done across the U.S., and our local quilters have established the Rio Linda, Elverta Quilt Trail Project.
The women gather every Tuesday afternoon in a member’s garage and paint. They paint on special wood boards and paints meant to handle whatever mother nature throws at the quilts, especially rain and wind. The women work from a thick pattern book. And, when there’s a special request, they do their best to work the theme into a pattern. Here’s where they work.
The only charge for a barn quilt is the cost of the materials, the labor of design and painting is free. Our hostess told us about a quilt they painted for a church, and when the pastor retired, they stitched him an actual quilt of the same design.
Their quilts can be found on barns, homes and businesses.
And, of course, we found other things to photograph. Also the featured image in this post, features one of our CTT members!
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A nice series. I’m seeing more of these barn quilts. There was a group around Tillamook, Oregon doing them.
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Thanks Tim. We will have to go back and continue the tour. We only went to about 3 houses/barns before it became hot. There will be more!
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Anne you’re welcome. I’ll look forward to seeing more.
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Rio Linda Community Methodist Church honored Pastor Debbie Dillon with the cloth version of our quilt square as she moves to a new pastorship. Our quilt square was in honor of RLCUMC’s 100th anniversary in2017.
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Thank you Linda for correcting my information. I do appreciate it. We will be on the trail again since we enjoyed it so much.
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What a curious thing these painted quilts!! Are they in California? I didn’t see anything like this last year in my road trip around California!!
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They are all over the U.S. mostly in rural areas. Rio Linda and Elverta are still rural here with farms, etc. Just google barn quilts and see what comes up. It’s amazing. Waiting for your next post!
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If I ever visit California again (I hope so!!) I’ll have my eyes wide open to look for these quilts!!! I love the idea of decorating rural buildings with these! hehehe
Uuuummm next post will take a few more days (or weeks)…. I’m working on something new!! I’ll let you know when it is ready! But thansk a mil for being there, it makes me really happy!!! 🙂
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How cool is that? I’ll have to keep my eyes peeled for these barn quilts when we travel on the backroads. I’m sure they’re all over the place, but I just never noticed them. Thanks for sharing the history and photos!
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You’re welcome Donna. Before you venture out, Google “Barn Quilts.” Often groups will post a map. Happy quilt hunting!
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