Title: Clamshell
Artist(s): Mary Vida Schafer
Material(s): Cotton, Polyester filling
Technique(s): Hand pieced and hand quilted
Dimensions: 96" x 81"
Date made: 1966
Place Created: Flushing, Genesee County, Michigan
Collection: Great Lakes Quilt Center/Michigan State University Museum
Photo Credit: KEVA

Interpretative Commentary:

This is Mary Schafer's most celebrated quilt and was made during Mary's "Challene Period." The complexity of piecing the Clamshell pattern, due to the connecting of convex and concave edges, made this historically a quilt with a high level of difficulty. Noted quilt author, Delores Hinson called it "One of Mary's best!" -- Mary Worrall

Additional Commentary:

This quilt won Best Pieced and Viewer's Choice awards in 1971 at the first National Quilt Association show, Greenbelt, Maryland. It was also exhibited at the Whaley House Museum and the Sloan Museum in Flint, Michigan, and included in the exhibit Mary Schafer Collection: A Legacy of Quilt History from July 29-December 31, 2001 at Michigan State University Museum. It was illustrated in Delores Hinson, A Quilter's Companion and Gwen Marston and Joe Cunningham, Mary Scafer and Her Quilts (figure 16, page 16). -- Beth Donaldson