Baby Quilts

Since Rose and I share an interest in quilting, I thought the history of baby quilts might be an interesting topic for a post. Not knowing much about baby stuff (or…history?), I didn’t realize that cribs are a relatively recent invention, and therefore baby quilts don’t have a very long history!

According to one of my favorite Half-Price Books finds, The Perfect Patchwork Primer by Beth Gutcheon, colonial-era quilts tended to be gigantic because they had to cover you, your husband, AND a couple of hatchlings.  Younger children would sleep in the master bed with their parents, and older children would sleep on trundles that were stowed away under the master bed during the day.  A quilt needed to be large enough to cover the larger bed and also hang down far enough to hide the trundles stored underneath.

This article by French quilter Christiane Billard has a lot of interesting information.  Cribs started being mentioned in New England writings around 1750, and we can assume that quilts for cribs followed soon thereafter.  However, it was still common practice until the middle of the 19th century for children to sleep in their parents’ bed.  In 1841, Catharine Beecher’s book Treatise on Domestic Economy was published--the first comprehensive guide to housekeeping published in the U.S.  The book was immensely successful.  Beecher  promoted the use of cribs, and American households soon fell in line with her way of thinking.  

In the 1800s, baby quilts were usually made by the pregnant mother or a grandmother for the first-born child.  The same quilt would then be used for each subsequent child until it fell apart from wear and tear.

Crib Quilt, Mill Wheel pattern, c. 1840, The Metropolitan Museum of Art 

Ballard points out that the aesthetics of baby quilts evolved as attitudes toward children changed during the Victorian era.  Baby quilts had been miniature versions of adult quilts, but as the sanctity of childhood began to be recognized and the genre of children’s literature started to flourish, baby quilts became more fanciful and educational in their motifs.  Baby quilts then started to feature appliqués of animals, letters, and scenes that would be amusing to children.  

Marion Whiteside Newton, Crib Quilt, Alice in Wonderland patterned, 1945, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Have you made, received, or purchased a remarkable baby quilt?  Tell your story in the comments or send me a photo if you have one!  I would love to compile a gallery for another post.