Ventura Quilt Show Pays Homage to Stitches in Time

Behind every quilt there’s a story, and when the Ventura County Museum of History and Art opens its newest exhibit Friday, you can peruse about 40 of these handmade beauties--some of them wildly contemporary, some centuries old.

Take the huge American flag quilt. This patriotic gem was handcrafted during World War I by a grandmother anxious for her young soldier-grandson (Carpinteria’s Judge J.S. Willbrandt) to return from the war.

And there’s the 1870s quilt that pioneer Mary Powell received when she left her Vermont home to head west. Each square in the design was sewn by friends who signed their names.

Flash forward 100 years to Bernice Weil’s colorfully intricate quilt that took her 14 summers to make, using scraps from the clothing she sewed for her six children, her husband and herself. It has bright, bold prints from the 1970s and swatches from western shirts she made her sons for Christmas.

Working in her Ojai home, Weil’s children helped her with the project during summer vacations.

“It was everybody’s quilt,” she said.

The quilts in the museum’s exhibit are on loan from local quilters like Weil, antique quilt collectors and local families that have hung on to these heirlooms. The display will be up through March 29.

Nationally, quilting is hot--ever since the 1976 Bicentennial celebration revived the craft. Locally it’s thriving too, quilt experts say, with guilds of around 200 or more quilters in Simi Valley, Camarillo, the Conejo Valley and the San Fernando Valley. Some even have waiting lists.

Quilt fans can also attend three special programs this month and next. The first, on Jan. 25 at 2 p.m., features Patty McCormick, who served as the quilt consultant for the 1995 movie “How to Make an American Quilt.”

Quilter Jane Tenorio-Coscarelli, who also worked on the movie, will join McCormick at the museum to talk about her children’s book, “The Tortilla Quilt,” a rancho story about making a quilt from tortilla flour sacks.

The museum’s Feb. 8 program is a hands-on session at 2 p.m. with veteran Ventura quilting instructor Jenny Carr Kinney, who will show novices how to hand-stitch a section of a quilt.

Finally, on Feb. 22 at 2 p.m., local quilters Charlotte Eckback and Kim Wulfert will display their antique quilts and explain how to date these old-timers and take care of them. (Quilt handlers usually wear white gloves.)

BE THERE

“Handmade History: Quilts of Ventura County,” opens Friday at the Ventura County Museum of History and Art, 100 E. Main St., Ventura. The museum is open every day except Monday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $3 for adults; children 16 and under and members are free. The quilt programs are free with the cost of admission. The one exception is the Jenny Carr Kinney class, for which a materials fee and reservations are required. For more information, call 653-0323.