Double-Faced Hourglass Quilt

This double-faced hourglass quilt, also known as a quarter-square triangle quilt, offers a colorful lesson in geometry. To construct each of the hand-sewn quilt’s eight-eight square blocks, four smaller squares of fabric are folded in half lengthwise to form isosceles triangles. The triangles are then stitched on the long edges into a square with the points meeting in the center. Sewn together, the square blocks create quilt that looks the same on both sides. The double-faced quilt’s fabrics feature a variety of colors, textures, and patterns, including solids, stripes, and plaids in heavyweight cottons, polyesters, and cotton-polyester blends. It is one of four quilts from the Sherry Sherrod DuPree Collection (acma-06-041), which documents the history of African American Holiness and Pentecostal movements (2003.0018.0002, 2003.0018.0003, 2003.0018.0004).