As the pursuit of vintage quilts becomes more difficult with increased scarcity, collectors today have nearly as many questions to ask about this popular craft as there are stitches in a log cabin pattern.
Are antique quilts still hot? Are there any good quilts left that the average person can afford? Where do you look? What do you look for? How do you combine a good antique quilt, if you are lucky enough to find it, with your decor?
All these and more will be covered by Thomas K. Woodard, a nationally renowned quilt expert, when he presents “Insider Tips on Antiques: Buying, Selling, Decorating” Monday to kick off the 26th Annual Winnetka Antiques Show.
Woodard and his partner, Blanche Greenstein, are proprietors of Thos. K. Woodard American Antiques & Quilts in New York, a 20-year-old gallery specializing in antique quilts and folk art.
They also are the co-authors of “Twentieth Century Quilts, 1900-1950,” (E.P. Dutton, $35 hardcover, $22.50 paperback), “The Poster Book of Quilts” (Dutton, $16.95) and their latest, “Classic Crib Quilts” (Dover Publications, $12.95).
“Quilts seem to be a perennial favorite of American collectors,” Woodard says. But he adds, European and Japanese collectors are attracted to quilts as well.
While “great” quilts are getting difficult to find, Woodard says, “there are a lot of `nice’ quilts around.” And though they can be pricey, “I think prices are stabilized right now. People are not throwing money around like they were in the ’80s.”
Ever-growing popularity
Prices at Woodard’s gallery begin at $750 and go up into the thousands. It is not uncommon for a museum-quality quilt to sell for $125,000, he says, and he has known of at least two quilts that sold for more than $200,000.
But, he adds, “those are very rare; these you can count on the fingers of one hand.”
He says prices started climbing in the 1970s, after the Bicentennial fomented an interest in American heritage. At that time, Woodard and his partner would go out into the countryside and buy old quilts for reasonable prices and then sell them in the city.
“We used to have stacks of quilts for under $100 for people who wanted to spend just that much,” he says. “But that stack disappeared after two or three years.”
Today, his shop’s lowest price is $750, “and we don’t even have a stack of those, only three or four. We have a lot in the $1,500 range,” he adds, and many in the $8,000 range.
“If you are not worried about condition, once in a while you can pick up a nice sort of utilitarian quilt for $300,” he says.
But, he warns, “it won’t grow in value, and it would be better to put the money one might spend on repairs into a better piece, make time payments if you have to.”
The supply of quilts seems to be more generous on the local scene, according to Gail Struve, owner of the Wild Goose Chase Gallery in Evanston.
“A lot of Americans have quilts in their closets, cedar chest, or on their beds or walls,” Struve says. “People bring them in to me. I never know what’s going to come in the door. Sometimes they are pretty nice. Sometimes they’re worthless.”
Because of the constant walk-in supply, she has a large supply in her gallery, she says, including Victorian quilts, old applique quilts from the 1850s and Amish quilts from 1910 to the 1930s.
Prices range, depending on condition, up to $4,000 for an Amish quilt, Struve says. But, she adds, one can buy a nice quilt from the 1920s or 1930s in good condition for $300 in her shop. Or a crazy quilt from the 1890s with little oil paintings as part of the design for $1,000.
The age factor
When you restore a quilt, you risk altering the appearance of the piece, and thus the value, Woodard adds.
What to look for when buying a quilt? “Condition is No. 1,” Woodard says.
The age of a quilt also is important. The earliest quilts in his shop are from the early 1840s.
Woodard doesn’t see any quilts that were made after 1940. He explains that quiltmaking flourished in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries; the largest number of quilts were made in the 1880s.
Figuring out the age of a quilt takes study. “You can pretty much generally get within 10 years,” Woodard says. You can’t just go by pattern, he says. Thread and fabric are crucial in dating. And you date the quilt by the latest fabric that is in it.
“Most quilters,” he explains, “have various projects going at once to make it more interesting. If you go to a quilter’s house, you would see all sorts of stages (of a quilt’s progress) from beginning to half-done.
“Also, a woman would make one-half of a quilt in the 1880s, set it aside and never get back to it and her daughter in 1910 might finish it,” Woodard says. “The finished quilt would be dated from 1910.”
Buyers beware
Collectors should be aware that “there are a lot of quilts around not as old as they are said to be,” says Woodard. “A lot of them are being hand-done in China. They are sold as new, but after a couple of washings they can easily pass for ’20s or ’30s quilts, unless you have a real expert looking at them, they are so well done.
“For a time, quilts were free of reproduction dangers, but as it becomes profitable to counterfeit something, it’s done. Now, it has hit the world of quilts,” says Woodard.
Because of reproductions today, it’s best to buy quilts from reputable quilt or antiques dealers.
Aesthetic considerations also are important in buying a quilt.
“One of the main things we look for in terms of the aesthetic value of a quilt is that it is unusual. . . . If the quilter did something totally original or made a commercial pattern her own, made it offbeat, whacko or gave it a quirkiness, we love that because it shows it wasn’t made by a machine; it makes it more special, original.”
If you love quilts and want to collect them, the thing to do is educate your eye, Woodard says.
“Look, look, look” at museums, quilt festivals, galleries, exhibitions, he advises.
Woodard says that many people aren’t sure what to do with a quilt, and he offers some suggestions.
For displaying: Hand-sew Velcro all around the edge. Then staple Velcro to a stretcher the size of the quilt and press the quilt edge to the stretcher’s.
“A lot of collectors just use (quilts) as added textural elements in a room,” he adds. “They just fold it at the base of a bed or over a chair so the quilts don’t receive everyday wear. By using them in different ways, you don’t have to worry about their size when you buy them.”
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Thomas K. Woodard will speak on “Insider Tips on Antiques: Buying, Selling, Decorating” at 1:30 p.m. Monday at the Winnetka Community House, 620 Lincoln Ave., Winnetka. Cost for Woodard’s lecture is $20, which includes desserts and beverages. Woodard’s books will be available for sale and for signing at the lecture.
Hours for the Winnetka Antiques Show are 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, noon to 5 p.m. March 5. Tickets are $8 for a three-day admission. Call: 312-263-4313.
