The Quilt Index is a searchable database for scholars, quilters and educators featuring over 50,000

quilts A quilt is a multi-layered textile, traditionally composed of two or more layers of fabric or fiber. Commonly three layers are used with a filler material. These layers traditionally include a woven cloth top, a layer of padding, batting or w ...

from documentation projects, museums, libraries, and private collections. It also has quilt-related

ephemera Ephemera are items which were not originally designed to be retained or preserved, but have been collected or retained. The word is etymologically derived from the Greek ephēmeros 'lasting only a day'. The word is both plural and singular. On ...

and curated essays and

lesson plans A lesson or class is a structured period of time where learning is intended to occur. It involves one or more students (also called pupils or learners in some circumstances) being taught by a teacher or instructor. A lesson may be either one ...

for teachers.

Functions and operations

The overall collection includes quilts made from the early nineteenth century to the twenty-first century, representing a wide range of

quilting Quilting is the process of joining a minimum of three layers of textile, fabric together either through stitching manually using a Sewing needle, needle and yarn, thread, or mechanically with a sewing machine or specialised longarm quilting ...

styles, techniques, purposes, and functions. Users can browse for quilts based on their time period, location of origin, style, purpose, or by the collection in which they are now housed. They can also search for specific quilts by a variety of

metadata Metadata (or metainformation) is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data itself, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive ...

, including quilting

pattern A pattern is a regularity in the world, in human-made design, or in abstract ideas. As such, the elements of a pattern repeat in a predictable manner. A geometric pattern is a kind of pattern formed of geometric shapes and typically repeated l ...

, quilter, and identification number.

Facilitators

The Alliance for American Quilts (AAQ),

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State or MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State o ...

(MSU)'s MATRIX: Center for Humane Arts, Letters and Social Sciences Online, and

Michigan State University Museum The Michigan State University Museum most commonly referred to as the ''MSU Museum'' is Michigan State University's oldest museum formed in 1857. It is the state of Michigan's first Smithsonian Affiliate. It was formed to support the work of the ...

present the Quilt Index. MSU staff members lead project work, in consultation with AAQ, the Quilt Index Task Force, the Quilt Index Editorial Board, and representatives from each contributor. The director is Marsha MacDowell, professor of art, history, and design at MSU. The project has been supported by major grants from the

National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...

and the

Institute for Museum and Library Services The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) is an independent agency of the United States federal government established in 1996. It is the main source of federal support for libraries and museums within the United States, having the m ...

. Contributing partners include: * The

American Folk Art Museum The American Folk Art Museum is an art museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City, at 2 Lincoln Square, Columbus Avenue at 66th Street. It is the premier institution devoted to the aesthetic appreciation of folk art and creativ ...

* American Quilt Study Group * Connecticut Quilt Search Project * The

Daughters of the American Revolution The National Society Daughters of the American Revolution (often abbreviated as DAR or NSDAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a patriot of the American Revolutionary War. A non-p ...

Museum * Hawaiian Quilt Research Project * Illinois Quilt Research Project quilts owned by

Illinois State Museum The Illinois State Museum features the life, land, people and art of the State of Illinois. In addition to natural history exhibits, the main museum in Springfield focuses on the state's cultural and artistic heritage. Exhibits include local foss ...

* State Historical Society of Iowa * The Kentucky Quilt Project at University of Louisville Archives and Records Center * The

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

American Folklife Center The American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. was created by Congress in 1976 "to preserve and present American Folklife". The center includes the Archive of Folk Culture, established at the library in 1928 as a rep ...

* The Louisiana Regional

Folklife Folklore is the body of expressive culture shared by a particular group of people, culture or subculture. This includes oral traditions such as tales, myths, legends, proverbs, poems, jokes, and other oral traditions. This also includes materi ...

Program * The Mary Gasperik Quilts * MassQuilts: The Massachusetts Quilt Documentation Project * The Merikay Waldvogel Private Collection * Michigan Quilt Project and Michigan State University Quilt Collection at

and Great Lakes Quilt Center * Minnesota Quilt Project * The Mountain Heritage Center * The Museum of the American Quilter's Society * New England Quilt Museum Collection * The Heritage Quilt Project of New Jersey at

Rutgers University Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's C ...

Libraries and Special Collections * North Carolina Museum of History * The International Quilt Study Center and the

Nebraska Quilt Project Nebraska ( ) is a landlocked state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It borders South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the sou ...

at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln * Quilts of Tennessee at Tennessee State Library and Archives * Rhode Island Quilt Documentation Project at the

University of Rhode Island The University of Rhode Island (URI) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Kingston, Rhode Island, United States. It is the flagship public research as well as the land-grant university of Rhode Island. The univer ...

* Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum * The Signature Quilt Project * Texas Quilt Search and the Winedale Quilt Collection at the Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin * West Virginia Heritage Quilt Search * The Wilene Smith Private Collection * Wyoming Quilt Project, Inc.

Copyright

Contributors to the Quilt Index retain

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...

to their contributions of data (both text and images), and agree to permanently license these contributions to the Quilt Index to display on the website for educational purposes.

History

The Quilt Index was first launched in 2003.

Collections, essays and exhibits

Although the Quilt Index is not an actual museum site with in-house collections, the Index does have online exhibitions which highlight works in its digital collection. These include: * Since Kentucky: Surveying State Quilts * Mary Schafer: Quilter, Quilt Collector, and Quilt Historian * Redwork: An American Textile Tradition * Mary Gasperik (1888-1969): Her Life And Her Quilts * Researching

Signature Quilts A signature (; from , "to sign") is a depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and intent. Signatures are often, but not always, handwritten or styliz ...

Wiki

The Quilt Index

Wiki A wiki ( ) is a form of hypertext publication on the internet which is collaboratively edited and managed by its audience directly through a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages that can either be edited by the public or l ...

, which became live in August 2008, is a collaborative, user-generated tool for quilters and quilt scholars featuring information about state and provincial quilt documentation projects, including publication lists and locations where records are housed. The wiki also provides an expanding directory of museums with quilt collections, and information about those collections. Users can also add information about local, regional and national

oral history Oral history is the collection and study of historical information from people, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people who pa ...

projects relating to quilt history to the wiki.The wiki is powered by

MediaWiki MediaWiki is free and open-source wiki software originally developed by Magnus Manske for use on Wikipedia on January 25, 2002, and further improved by Lee Daniel Crocker,mailarchive:wikipedia-l/2001-August/000382.html, Magnus Manske's announc ...

software. Although not fully

WYSIWYG In computing, WYSIWYG ( ), an acronym for what you see is what you get, refers to software that allows content to be edited in a form that resembles its appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product, such as a printed document, web ...

, instructions for editing the wiki are available on its main page.

Works

Conference presentations

* Justine Richardson, Dean Rehberger, Marsha MacDowell, Amanda Sikarskie, Mary Worrall, "The Quilt Index Goes 2.0: A Fiberspace Case Study," Presented: April 16, 2009, at Museums and the Web 2009. * Marsha MacDowell and Mary Worrall, "The Quilt Index: Documenting and Accessing an American Art," poster session, College Art Association, Los Angeles, accepted for presentation in February 2009. * Mark Kornbluh, The Quilt Index: Online Tools and Ephemera Expansion, Let's Do I.t. RIght! Museum Computer Network 36th Annual Conference Program, Washington, D.C., November 14, 2008. * Marsha MacDowell, "The Quilt Index and Quilt Treasures: New Tools for American Art and Art History Research and Education," Department of Art and Art History Faculty Lecture Series, November 11, 2008. * Mary Worrall. "Documenting Quilting Traditions: Sharing Stories and Stitches." Michigan Oral History Association. Rogers City, Michigan, November 2008. * Marsha MacDowell, "The Quilt Index: A Tool for Preservation, Collection Management, Education, and Research," Cooperstown Graduate Association, Cooperstown, NY, Oct. 4, 2008. * Mary Worrall, Marsha MacDowell and Justine Richardson. "The Quilt Index: Communicating Stories in the Stitches." Textile Society of America Biennial Symposium. Honolulu, Hawaii, September 2008. * Mary Worrall, “Textiles and Technology: The Quilt Index as a National Model for Online Thematic Collections,” Michigan Museums Association, Flint, MI, 2006. * Mary Worrall, “Piecing History: Quilt Documentation and the Quilt Index,” Florida Museum of Natural History, Gainesville, FL, 2006. * Marsha MacDowell, Mary Worrall, Patricia Crews, Jennifer Gilbert, Justine Richardson, “Stitching Data: The Quilt Index as a National Model for Online Thematic Collections Session,” American Association of Museums Annual Meeting and Expo, Boston, MA, April 29, 2006.

Publications

* *

References

External links

* {{Textile arts Databases in the United States Open-access archives Quilting Textile arts organizations