Amish Quilts and the Welsh Connection

Book excerpt: Amish quilts always excite interest and admiration but 'Amish Quilts and the Welsh Connection' presents a new perspective on this very special group of American quilts. In comparing the acknowledged visual similarities between Amish quilts and lesser-known Welsh quilts, the author considers how these visual connections could have come about, and whether the Welsh quilt-making style could have influenced the early development of Amish quilts. Author Dorothy Osler presents a carefully argued case for cross-over in design style to Amish quilts from equally dramatic Welsh quilts when Welsh immigrants settled close to Amish communities in nineteenth-century America.