Windham Fabrics 42" Cotton The Quilts of GEE'S BEND 30069-23 deep purple

Gee's Bend Quiltmakers

The Gee’s Bend quiltmakers are a group of women and their ancestors from the Gee’s Bend area of Alabama’s rural Black Belt, whose quilts are celebrated as some of the most significant artistic contributions to American art history. Earning international recognition and acclaim, their work has been showcased in exhibitions at museums and galleries across the U.S. and beyond. Through Souls Grown Deep’s Collection Transfer Program, Gee’s Bend quilts are now part of the permanent collections of more than 40 museums across three continents.

The area’s rich quiltmaking tradition dates back to the nineteenth century, born out of a need to keep warm in unheated homes during the winter months. Due to resource scarcity, the majority of quilts well into the twentieth century were made from old work clothes and other used materials, such as fertilizer and flour sacks. Despite the wider availability of cheap fabric in the second half of the twentieth century, the recycling of old materials remains a central tenet of quilting in Gee's Bend.

The practice of reusing old materials has led to a preference for improvisational approaches to quilt design. Many Gee's Bend quilts can be called improvisational, or "my way" quilts, as they are known locally, in which quiltmakers start with basic forms and then follow their own individual artistic paths ("their way") to stitch unexpected patterns, shapes, and colors. The transference of aesthetic knowledge and skills from generation to generation has been fundamental to the continuation of the Gee's Bend quilting tradition to this day.