Crazy Quilt

crazy quilt, coverlet made by stitching irregular fabric patches together, either by appliqué or patchwork (piecing). Usually the patches are stitched to a fabric or paper foundation. Fabrics vary from cottons and wools to silks, brocades, and velvets, the latter known as “fancies.” The finished top is often enhanced with embroidery, beading, and other embellishments. Crazies are usually tied instead of quilted to stabilize the layers.

Crazy quilting’s origins are uncertain. Sixteenth-century Japanese kirihame kimonos include crazy piecing. An 1839 cotton crazy-pieced Kaleidoscope quilt is owned by the Maryland Historical Society; like other early cotton crazies, including an 1872 example in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it features little or no embroidery.

At Philadelphia’s Centennial Exposition in 1876, American needleworkers were intrigued by the designs and techniques of handicrafts from Japan, Russia, and England. The Japanese fashion of deliberately “crazing,” or crackling, porcelain glazes was particularly influential. By 1884, thousands of lavishly embroidered silk and velvet crazy quilts had appeared, encouraged by popular magazines marketing everything from patterns to fabric scraps. Although the fad had largely subsided by 1895, crazies still appeared, particularly in wool or in cotton as utility quilts—the irregular patches enabled frugal women to use every scrap of fabric. The embellished fancy-fabric crazy quilt experienced a resurgence in the 1980s and l990s, thanks to teachers like Judith Montano and groups like the Crazy Quilt Society and to a renewed interest in embroidery and embellishments. Crazy quilts are often commemorative or memory pieces.