Top Ten Titles for Antique Quilt Study

The Best Books for Antique Quilt Study

Ask ten quilt historians to recommend the most important books on quilt history, and you’ll probably get ten different answers. That is exactly what happened when this survey was first conducted in 2001 on the Quilt History List. Be sure to see What Would Make the List Today?

The historians and researchers who contributed to this list had spent decades studying quilts, textiles, quiltmakers, and the stories behind them. Many owned libraries containing hundreds, or even thousands, of books. Yet when asked which titles they considered essential, certain books appeared again and again.

Some recommendations were obvious classics. Patsy and Myron Orlofsky’s Quilts in America, Barbara Brackman’s Clues in the Calico, and Ruth Finley’s Old Patchwork Quilts and the Women Who Made Them were repeatedly cited as foundational works. Other recommendations reflected specific interests such as textile history, regional quilt studies, African American quilt traditions, oral history, and quilt documentation projects.

What I found most interesting were the comments that accompanied the lists. The late quilt historian Cuesta Benberry observed that no one has every quilt book ever printed and encouraged collectors to remain open-minded. Her advice was simple: if it contains information about quilts, collect it. Even books containing outdated or incorrect information can be valuable to future researchers because they document how ideas about quilts evolved over time.

Several contributors emphasized that quilt study extends far beyond patterns and bedcovers. They recommended books about fabrics, social history, women’s history, oral traditions, museum collections, and regional studies. As Virginia Gunn noted, quilts are artifacts of material culture. To understand the quilts, we must also understand the people who made them and the world in which they lived.

Many contributors also stressed the importance of primary research. The annual Uncoverings volumes published by the American Quilt Study Group were frequently mentioned, as were state quilt documentation projects and symposium papers. These works represent the continuing effort to move quilt history beyond family stories and assumptions toward documented scholarship.

This list is a snapshot of what respected quilt historians considered essential reading at the turn of the twenty-first century. Some titles have since been supplemented by newer research, while others remain classics more than a century after they were first published. Together they provide an excellent starting point for anyone interested in antique quilts, quilt history, textile studies, or the people whose lives are stitched into these remarkable objects.

Whether you are just beginning your research journey or adding to an already overflowing quilt library, these books continue to offer valuable insights into the history, artistry, and cultural significance of quilts.

101 Patchwork Patterns – Ruby McKim
A Piece of My Soul
A Gallery of Amish Quilts; Design Diversity among the plain people
All Flags Flying; The Great American Quilt Contest and Festival
Always There: The African-American Presence in American Quilts – Cuesta Benberry
America’s Glorious Quilts – Elizabeth Warren & Sharon Eisenstadt
America’s Quilts and Coverlets – Carleton Safford & Robert Bishop
American Quilts and How to Make Them
American Quilts – Elizabeth Wells Robertson
American Quilts and Coverlets – Florence Peto
American Quilts and Coverlets in the Metropolitan Museum of Art – Amelia Peck
An Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns – Barbara Brackman
Baltimore Album Quilts – Dena Katzenberg
Calico & Chintz – (Adamson)
Clues in the Calico: A Guide to Dating and Identifying Antique Quilts – Barbara Brackman
Crazy Quilts – Penny McMorris
Dating Fabrics – Eileen Trestain
Encyclopedia of Appliqué – Barbara Brackman
English and American Textiles from 1790 to the Present – Mary Schoeser & Celia Rufey
Gee’s Bend
Hands All Around
Hearts and Hands: The Influence of Women and Quilts on American Society –
Historic Quilts – Florence Peto
Homage to Amanda
In the Heart of Pennsylvania: 19th and 20th Century Quiltmaking Traditions –
Index of American Design – Erwin O. Christensen
Just New from the Mills: Printed Cotton in America – Diane L. Fagan Affleck
Keep Me Warm One Night – Harold B. Burnham & Dorothy K. Burnham
Mary Schafer and Her Quilts – Gwen Marston & Joe Cunningham
New Discoveries in American Quilts
North Carolina Quilts – Ruth Haislip Robinson
Old Patchwork Quilts and the Women Who Made Them – Ruth Finley
Old Quilts – William Rush Dunton
Patchwork Quilts – Averil Colby
Patchwork Souvenirs of the 1933 Worlds Fair
Pieced by Mother Symposium Papers – Jeannette Lasansky (editor)
Printed Textiles: English and American Cottons and Linens, 1700-1850 –
Quilting – Averil Colby
Quilts and Other Bed Coverings in the Canadian Tradition – Ruth McKendry
Quilts: Their Story and How to Make Them – Marie Webster
Quilts in America – Patsy Orlofsky & Myron Orlofsky
Quilts in Community: Ohio’s Traditions – Ricky Clark, George Knepper & Ellice Ronsheim
QuiltTreasures of Great Britian: The Heritage Search of the Quilters Guild
Shelburne Museum: The Quilt – Kei Kobayashi
Soft Covers for Hard Times: Quiltmaking and the Great Depression – Merikay Waldvogel
SouthernQuilts
Stitching Memories: African-American Story Quilts – Eva Ungar Grudin
Textile Designs: 200 Years of European Patterns – Susan Meller & Joost Elffers
Textiles in America, 1650-1870 – Florence Montgomery
The Quilt Engagement Calendars (series)
The Quiltmaker’s Handbook – Michael James
The Quilters: Women and Domestic Art – Patricia Cooper & Norma Bradley Buferd
The Quilt Digest (Series) – Michael Kile, editor
The Romance of the Patchwork Quilt in America – Carrie Hall & Rose Kretsinger
The Pieced Quilt: An American Design Tradition – Jonathan Holstein
The Quilts of Gees Bend
The Freedom Quilting Bee – Nancy Callahan
The Quilts of Tennessee
The Art of Needle-Work from the Earliest Ages – Countess of Wilton
The Quilt Encyclopedia Illustrated
The Amish Quilt – Rachel Pellman & Kenneth Pellman Granick
The American Quilt – Roderick Kiracofe
The Romance of Double Wedding Ring Quilts
The Quilt: Stories from the NAMES Project – Cindy Ruskin & Matt Herron
The Quilts of the British Isles
Traditional Quilting: Its Story and Its Practice – Mavis Fitzrandolph
Traditional British Quilts – Dorothy Osler
Treasury of American Quilts
Twentieth Century Quilts 1900 – 1970; Women Make their Mark
Twentieth Century Quilts, 1900-1950 – Thomas Woodward & Blanche Greenstein
Uncoverings (series, American Quilt Study Group)
White Work