Linda R. Baumgarten

Books

Art of Quilting The Art of Quilting, a Pattern and Coloring Book.
Williamsburg: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2016.

From the back cover... The designs contained in these pages are all taken from quilts in the extraordinary collections of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. The patterns can be colored or used as inspiration for quilts and other fiber arts. Both coloring and quiling tap into creativity within disciplines that are defined by lines, borders, and structure. Adding brilliant new colors to these designs breathes new life into these historic quilts and makes the past live again.

Four Centuries of Quilts Four Centuries of Quilts, The Colonial Williamsburg Collection with Kimberly Smith Ivey. Williamsburg and New Haven: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and Yale University Press, 2014.

From the cover... Quilts are among the most utilitarian of art objects, yet the best among them possess a formal beauty that rivals anything made on canvas. This landboark book, drawn from the world-renound collection of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, highlights the splendor and craft of quilts with more than three hundred superb color images and details. Fascinating essays by two noted scholars trace the evolution of quilting styles and trends as they relate to the social, political, and economic issues of their time.

Costume Close-Up Costume Close-up with John Watson and Florine Carr. New York: Quite Specific Media Group, Inc. and Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1999. (Reprinted.)

From the back cover... This book unveils the secrets of eighteenth-century garments in the collection of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Experts and novices alike will enjoy the engaging presentation of text, period illustrations, and modern photography. Examining stitch marks, thread remnants, and creases, the authors solve the mysteries of how clothing was made, altered, and sometimes, even how it was laundered and stored. In the course of their investigation, they illuminate aspects of the manufacture and wearing of eighteenth-century clothing, from how wool was glazed (the textiles were folded and placed in a press) to who wore under drawers (Thomas Jefferson and George Washington did, but many men did not).

What Clothes Reveal What Clothes Reveal, The Language of Clothing in Colonial and Federal America.
New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.

Winner of Costume Society of America’s Millia Davenport award for excellence in publication. Colonial Williamsburg has one of the outstanding period costume collections in the world. The 900 costumes and 2,400 accessories document the way Americans dressed during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and the European antecedents that influenced their clothes. Using the collection as a backdrop, this book helps people today understand more fully the lives of past Americans. A discussion of slave and work clothes highlights the complexity of outfits that convey status, occupation, and place. Other chapters demonstrate how clothing reflects life passages and interprets the myths and meanings of garments in British and American society. Informative and entertaining sidebars delve into details about individual garments and concepts such as clothing fossilization and whether people were really smaller back then.

18th c. Clothing Eighteenth-Century Clothing at Williamsburg. Williamsburg: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1986. (in print since 1986.)

From the cover... Basing her research on the outstanding collection of antique costumes, prints, and paintings at Colonial Williamsburg, Linda Baumgarten, curator of textiles, explores the tremendous variety in eighteenth-century wearing apparel, which ranges from the course linen suit or simple bodice and petticoats worn by a workingman or woman to an elegant ball gown or the gentleman's embroidered silk velvet suit that is featured on the cover. The author also discusses the kinds of accessories — fans, laces, aprons, gloves, handkerchiefs, pocketbooks — that people selected to complement their clothing



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