Antique Rugs

Sherring Burke from Shell, Wyoming, a friend of Patty Tyrrell, has some wonderful old hooked rugs that she was willing to share.

This is a rug Sherring purchased. I love the simplicity of the design and the color combinations. It shows that a design doesn't need to be completely filled in with elements to be an effective design.

This is another of Sherring's antique rugs. Her grandfather had this rug in his cabin so it was used for many years. Again, such a simple design with so much impact.

Sherring purchased this rug showing maple syrup production in Vermont. She sure has a great eye for old rugs!

Now this is a rug given to my friend Kathi Charles by a real estate client of hers.  His mother hooked the rug but it needs help on the edges. Kathi is going to add rug tape to the back to stabilize the edges which are rotting away. Besides being a great design, I love how the hooker chose to hook the inside frames.
There is so much we can learn by looking at the old "Masters" of rug hooking.

March Meeting of Wild West Rug Hookers

Saturday, March 15th was a small group of rug hookers but a very exciting meeting. Carol Messerli had finished her floral rug and it turned out great! It is her second rug and her first large rug.

Her background is Dorr's natural windowpane. It made an exciting background with a lot of movement.

Here Carol is working on her next rug. She has a photo of an elk that her daughter enlarged for her to use for a pattern. She is shown here outlining the lines she needs to draw on her red dot so she can see them better.  This rug is going to be a learning experience for all of us and I can't wait to see Carol create it.

Patty Tyrrell is almost done with her Cat Tails rug.  I absolutely love how it turned out.

Her lighter wool for the little hearts and outside border is a Rebbecca Erb wool. It is the perfect compliment to her red background wool.

Since it was National Quilting Day, Kathi Charles worked on a quilt. She brought her sewing machine just in case, but was still cutting the applique out when the day was done.

Here I am working on the border of my Buck rug. This is going to be the outside border. I decided this rug is big enough.

A special guest showed up to interview us about our hooking. Elaine Thatcher from Logan Utah is working for the Wyoming Folk Arts Program, Wyoming Arts Council. She has been in our area interviewing different people about traditional forms of artistic expression, life ways, crafts, history and lore from Wyoming. We all had a wonderful time telling Elaine our stories. She recorded the conversations and took pictures of our rugs, which will be archived at the University of Wyoming.

The Wyoming Arts Council provided leadership and invests resources to sustain, promote and cultivate excellence in the arts. They provide funding and support for projects big and small, all over the state. They reach beyond the obvious venues to recognize art where it happens, like our room at the Park County Library, living rooms, and community centers.

We had as much fun learning about the Wyoming Arts Council as Elaine did learning from us. We never know who is going to walk through the door next. Thank you Elaine Thatcher for such an exciting day.

This blog post is written by Sylvia Gauthier 3/16/2014.