Winter Flowers Quilt

One of five quilts in the Rankin collection, made from a Leeward Company Kit, this Winter Flowers quilt was made in 1987. It is signed with the year.

The central motif of the quilt is a large medallion of stylized blue flowers and green leaves. An inner, green, lace-like frame sets the medallion off. The medallion is composed of a central large blue flower with eight petals. From each petal springs a large green fern-like leaf, and from the ferns come more leaves. A ring of small blue flowers encompasses these plants. Outside the ring of twenty-eight small flowers are further vegetal decorations. Large ferns alternate with small ferns to frame centrally placed blue fruit, possibly pomegranates. The quilt binding blends with the cream-colored top. A fan shaped lacy cross-stitched border in sage green runs close the edge of the quilt. At the corners are embroidered four blue flowers with eight petals; they stand on a short stem with two leaves. Equidistant in the space between the corners are smaller blue flowers of a similar shape.

Winter flowers may refer to the color scheme; the big blue flower and its lacy appearance do evoke the intricacy of a snowflake. The appearance of pomegranates in quilt design was once significant. Pomegranates usually signify abundance and fruitfulness. But by employing pomegranates in this design there may be a hidden reference to the journey of Persephone to the underworld in classical mythology. She lived on six pomegranate seeds during the winter months. Because of this, she was allowed to return to the world of the living for six summer months. Winter flowers, like Persephone’s seeds, are the promise of new life and growth.