Western North Carolina is often celebrated for its magnificent and botanically diverse landscape. But it is also widely known for the rich craft heritage of its mountain communities. 

     The studios and workshops of potters, quilters and other artists dot the landscape and bring a creative and industrious flair to the region. 

This season's quilt pattern

Kaleidoscope Quilt Block Pattern

The North Carolina Arboretum Quilt Garden - 2008 & 2009
The optical toy – the kaleidoscope, must have inspired kaleidoscope quilts. 

The Kaleidoscope is perhaps the most well known of all optical toys. Known to the ancient Greeks, the Kaleidoscope was rediscovered and patented in 1817 by the Scottish scientist Sir David Brewster. The name "Kaleidoscope" is a combination of three Greek words kalos (beautiful), eidos (form), and skopios (view) that mean "an instrument with which we can see things of beautiful form." After the publication in 1819 of Brewster's Treatise on the Kaleidoscope, it was only a short while before the Kaleidoscope became an extremely popular toy.

In its simplest form, the Kaleidoscope is actually a Taleidoscope or mirrored Kaleidoscope, In a Taleidoscope, three mirrors are taped together. The mirrors for a hollow triangle and are placed in a long tube. One end of the tube is open and the other end is covered with a hole in its center. By looking through the hole at the end of the tube and rotating it, you can see beautiful changing patterns.  (bigcamera.com, www.wikipedia.org)

Kaleidoscope–effect quilts, in which a symmetrical design radiates from the center of the block, or multiple symmetrical designs arrange themselves in creative patterns draw the admiration and envy of many quilters.  Just as hand-held kaleidoscopes fascinate children of all ages, the intricacy, order, and mysterious changeability of these quilted creations attract us.

The kaleidoscope block exhibited in the 2008 and 2009 Quilt Garden at The NC Arboretum is simplified to four triangles.  Each 8’ x 8’ block is filled with the triangular layout and turned, or tessellated to fill the garden with a kaleidoscope of floral color.