Recently I purchased a group of old wool suiting samples. I have no idea how old they are, but they are definitely vintage — the stickers are yellowed and brittle and the swatches are mostly all wool, with a few wool/silk and wool/rayon blends, but with no modern synthetics. The patterns are cool, the fabrics have great feel to them and they are in wonderful condition — there are only a few with moth holes under the stickers (I guess moths like glue). My plan is to embroider the squares and make a wool throw similar to a quilt in a photo I saved ages ago (and can no longer remember where it came from). The original quilt used dark and light/medium wool squares — probably samples just like mine — with embroidery only on the dark squares. Because I have more dark samples than medium or light, I went to the Goodwill on Friday and purchased a few vintage men’s wool slacks and cut them up. Now I have enough lights and I can also use these pieces for borders. The embroidery patterns are from many sources — old transfers of mine, the Simplicity Needlework Catalog, and the Hoop Love Vintage Transfers group on Flickr.
This is the first row of blocks (4 1/2″ finished size) — all I’ve completed so far
Here is the photo of the antique quilt I saw somewhere online
And here are some of the samples I purchased — most about 5″ x 8″
