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This very lovely old quilt design, sometimes known as "Washington Pavement" is
not nearly so intricate to make as you might imagine. The cutting is
especially important as it takes so many even width strips, all with exact 45
degree angles at the ends. But the sewing is straight seams such as may be run
on the machine. The pattern may or may not allow for seams, depending on the
finished size of each block.
It is suggested for an all-over pattern. One of the most exquisite quilts we
have ever seen was this pineapple cut small and done of all gorgeous bits of
silk, working from very light center such as lemon yellow, shell pink or ivory
through varying values of light to dark with dark green, brown, wine red and
even black for the large corner triangles. These corners each boasted a bit
of silken embroidery, thus using odd scraps of floss with the old neckties,
velvets, brocades, etc.
This may also be a wash material quilt of scraps, each block of white and some
one print, or running the sequence of color values from light to dark each time.
The blocks finish about 18 inches square, four blocks wide by 4 1/2 blocks long
would be good proportion, and two complete finished blocks could be cut in half
if the seams were machine done.
Some women prefer to build this sort of block on a foundation of flour sack or
such material, starting at the center square, of course, and covering to turn
back each time. This way the center square is basted into position with raw
edges left all around. The four dark triangles seam to turn back one over each
side, with raw edges again to their outsides. Press, and repeat with the four
shortest light blocks, etc. In quilt parlance this sort of technique was
known as making a "pressed quilt."
A full sized Pineapple quilt will take about ten yards of cloth.
In quilting a design of this sort best results are obtained by stitching along
the seams - say 3/8 of an inch either side of all piecing seams. Where the four
triangles come together a design may be quilted, such as Thistles, Shells or
Maple Leaves.
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