Recycled clothing was commonly used to make patchwork quilts in working class, American households in the early 20th century, and this quilt is made from old denim work-clothing pieces. The origin of this quilt is not known, but many “blue jean” quilts were made in African American communities in the South. Clothing is intimately tied to people and memory, and there is poignancy to sleeping under a bedcover made of clothes once worn by loved ones. Mary Lee Bendolph, a quiltmaker from Gee’s Bend, Alabama, has spoken of the significance of using work clothes in quilts, saying “… they remind you of where you have been and where the Lord have brought you from.”
