Barn Quilts in Rural America

Enlarge Image Image Gallery A Snail’s Trail barn quilt, owned by Donna Sue Groves, Manchester, Ohio, turns courtesy Donna Sue Groves

Drivers are taking note of a colorful new crop sprouting up all across rural America – king-size quilt blocks mounted on back-road barns. The brightly painted designs, patterned after traditional quilt blocks, are placed on plywood sheets often using an 8-by-8-foot scale so they’re easy to see from the road. The quilts offer a comforting slice of Americana, and movement organizers hope that eventually, like a clothesline, quilts on barns will stretch across the nation.  

Why such enthusiasm for these colorfully adorned barns and, in a few cases, garages, corncribs and other rural buildings? 

“We want to entice people to take roads less traveled, to visit businesses and rural locations they might not otherwise encounter,” says Mary Jo Stutenberg of Cuba City, Wisconsin, whose barn carries an “American Pride” pattern.  

A matter of choice 

The choice of pattern for Mary Jo and Mark Stutenberg couldn’t be more appropriate. 

“It’s a tribute to our son who served 15 months in Iraq and to our fathers who served in World War II,” Mary Jo says. “We absolutely love it. The barn looks better than it has in a long time.” 

Her county – Lafayette, in southern Wisconsin – now has close to a dozen mounted quilt patterns, with more to come. 

“Quilts,” she says, “are symbols of our rural heritage. They provide not only warmth and comfort, but a social opportunity and artistic outlet, too.” 

Donna Sue Grove, the Ohioan behind the U.S. movement to erect barn quilts throughout the nation, says, “Barn quilts are public art that celebrates the place people call home. (The quilts) make people feel good about themselves and where they live.” 

The quilt squares definitely are warming the Wisconsin countryside. In the Badger State’s Racine County, 21 barn quilts are already mounted, part of a “Quilts on Barns – the Beauty of Rural Art” project co-sponsored by the Racine Arts Council and the Racine County Convention and Visitors Bureau.