BARN QUILTS of Bureau County n
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A SPLASH OF COLOR AROUND EVERY CORNER art of the fun of visiting Bureau County is slowing down to explore the backroads. When you’re meandering along these country roads, you’ll notice flashes of color as you drive past various barns. You should pay close attention to the farms you’re passing because you don’t want to miss one of the over 101 barn quilts that have been placed on farm buildings in 88 locations all over the county. For those who have never seen these unique works of art, a barn quilt is a quilt block design painted on a special type of plywood called MDO board. The blocks usually measure 4x4 feet or 8x8 feet. No fabric is
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used in the design – the color all comes from exterior paint. Each displays a colorful quilt block chosen from a traditional quilt design or something personal to that farm owner. This nationwide phenomenon was born in 2001 in Adams County, Ohio, when Donna Sue Groves promised her mother to paint her a quilt block. Her mother was an accomplished quilter, and she thought this would brighten up their colorless, gray barn. The barn quilt that was painted for her mother sparked the barn quilt movement throughout the United States and Canada. The book “Barn Quilts and the American Quilt Trail Movement” by Suzi Parron with
