Tessile adds Christmas to quilt list
By Marvin Lazaro -- Home Textiles Today, 2/5/2001
NEW YORK -Tessile Inc. will debut four new hand-quilted designs for the February mini-market in addition to various table linen patterns, tree skirts and accessories.
Towner Lapp, national sales manager for the Brooklyn, NY-based manufacturer, said the foray into Christmas designs is a first for the company.
"We're doing it for quilts because we see it as an expanding line of Christmas looks," Lapp said. "Table linens and [related product] have been a Christmas item for years. We're looking to get involved in both areas."
Two of the quilt designs will be Tessile designs, while two will be part of the company's licensed Mount Vernon line.
Dancing Snowflakes is blue and cream colored cotton velvet with cotton backing and polyester fill, said Marjorie Card, fashion director for Tessile. "It's a big, graphic traditional patchwork quilt," she said.
Holly Day features rows of holly and berries in stripes running across the body of the quilt. It is also 100 percent cotton with cotton fill.
Of the two additions to the Mount Vernon Collection, neither are specifically Christmas quilts, Card said, but are being introduced with Tessile's other Christmas products.
Delaware Crossing, like some of its predecessors from the Mount Vernon Collection, is a reproduction of an older quilt from George Washington's ancestral home in Mount Vernon, VA. The design features red flowers with green leaves in the center with a border of green vine and red flowers.
Liberty, the second of the new designs, is a patchwork and applique that depicts reproductions of revolutionary flags in red, white and blue.
"Both of the Mount Vernon quilts, like the ones we introduced earlier, are complicated and need lots of research," Card said, adding that the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association (MVLA), which owns the Mount Vernon license, helps research the designs.
Both of the Mount Vernon quilts are 100 percent cotton with cotton fill and cotton backing.
The Mount Vernon Collection license is the first license granted for bed linens by the MVLA. Portions of the sales go to restore and maintain the Mount Vernon estate.
