The McMinn County Living Heritage Museum is nationally recognized for its support of textile arts and its repository of vintage textiles. The museum has in collection more than 100 quilts dating from 1850 to 1920. Additionally, the museum has an extensive collection of vintage hats, clothing and woven textiles.

The McMinn County Living Heritage Museum holds two annual textile shows, a Hooked Rug Show every March and a Quilt Show each autumn.

The Museum's annual textile show "Art Underfoot" is a celebration of the traditional craft of Rug Hooking. The 2013 Hooked Rug Show will be held at the Museum from March 4th to March 28th. Rug Entry Submission Form.

The 2013 Hook-In will be held Friday, March 8th and Saturday, March 9th.
Hook In Registration Form

Vendors should register separately. Vendor Registration Form

Rug hooking is a craft where rugs are made by pulling loops of yarn or fabric through a stiff woven base such as burlap, linen, or rug warp. The loops are pulled through the backing material by using a crochet hook. In its earliest years, rug hooking was a craft of poverty. Poor women began looking through their scrap bags for materials to employ in creating their own home-made floor coverings. The modern preference for using only cut wool strips in hooked rugs originated with Pearl McGown in the 1930s and the craft has seen a resurgence in popularity and is now viewed as form of fine art.

2013 QUILT SHOW INFORMATION

The Museum's 2013 Quilt Show will be held from September 28th to October 19th and is a celebration of "The Year of the Art Quilt". Sponsored by Crescent Sock, the 2013 event will host a judged quilt competition and a presentation by Fiber Artist Susan Lenz. The museum will also host presentations on the textile industry in McMinn County and hold presentations on the study of quilts as historic documents.

Information on the NEW 2013 Quilt Show.
Press Release

Registration
Rules and Categories

You can look long and hard and you won't find an object more central to the history of women than the quilt. Unique among objects, quilts are both lowly "women's work" and great art. They are something made from nothing; they are both nurturing and inspiring. They can communicate both family memories and great societal truths. They tell stories of our mothers, our sisters, ourselves. They tell stories of culture. They are historical documents. They tell the stories of our nation.

The following award winning quilt by Marion Coleman is entitled "Waiting for the Freedom Train".