Folk art style dates back to the Civil War era
What to do on a cold winter day (or days) – when you want to stay warm and snug indoors . . . and you are bored? You get a telephone call from friends that the day has been proclaimed as “Craft Project Day!”
This particular Wednesday, it was work on “penny rugs” – a folk art style dating from the 1800s – beginning at around the time of the Civil War. Making penny mats is a perfect project for thrifty-minded artisans. Fabric was a precious commodity circa the Civil War, so scraps of wool or felted wool from old clothing, blankets and hats were used – adding color to homes.
Using coins as templates (hence the name penny rug), circles were created and cut out, and then each piece was stitched with a blanket stitch using any choice of color of embroidery floss. Sometimes the mats were backed with old burlap bags or feed sacks, while today wool or linen is usually used as a backing. Once-in-awhile, a penny was stitched inside the mat to make it lie flat.
The penny rugs are not really rugs – but mats – that can be used as decorative coverings for beds, tables, dressers and mantles. Occasionally they are even used as wall hangings or pillows. Most of the designs are based on varying size circles, but some even include images from everyday life, such as cats, flowers, birds, trees; and shapes like stars and hearts.
On this project day, old sports and suit jackets, an old black overcoat and scraps of wool felt (all gleaned from Care & Share of Mountain Lake) were used as the material choices from which to cut the circles. In this case, the “pennies” circle templates included a Ball jar cover, the cover from a jar of Vick’s and one end of a spool of thread.
