Mary Lee Bendolph of Gee's Bend Blocks, Strips, Strings & Half Squares Rug - 3' x 5'

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Bring the whimsy and vibrant imagination of the Gee's Bend quilters into your home with our exclusive "Blocks, Strips, Strings, and Half Squares" hand-loomed cotton rug based on the quilt by Mary Lee Bendolph of Gee's Bend, part of the Philadelphia Museum of Art's permanent collection. Made in India by a Good Weave authorized maker. 

From the Souls Grown Deep website: "The residents of Gee’s Bend, Alabama are direct descendants of the enslaved people who worked the cotton plantation established in 1816 by Joseph Gee. After the Civil War, their ancestors remained on the plantation working as sharecroppers. In the 1930s the price of cotton fell and the community faced ruin. As part of its Depression-era intervention, the Federal Government purchased ten thousand acres of the former plantation and provided loans enabling residents to acquire and farm the land formerly worked by their ancestors. Unlike the residents of other tenant com­munities, who could be forced by economic circumstances to move—or who were sometimes evicted in retaliation for their efforts to achieve civil rights—the people of the Bend could retain their land and homes. Cultural tradi­tions like quiltmaking were nourished by these continuities.

Throughout this time, and up until the present, the settlement's unique patchwork quilting tradition that began in the 19th century has endured. Hailed by the New York Times as “some of the most miraculous works of modern art America has produced,” Gee’s Bend quilts constitute a crucial chapter in the history of American art and today are in the permanent collections of over 20 leading art museums.

Mary Lee Bendolph is one of the world’s pre-eminent quilters. She has had numerous individual shows and has been honored for her achievements by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

• Estimated delivery week of December 13th
• Philadelphia Museum of Art exclusive design
• 3' x 5'
• 100% cotton
• Hand-loomed