Greek Quilt

History

The quilt was made by Maria Efstathis in El Arish, Queensland in the 1950s. It was made for her daughter, Christine Kyprios, who has been the only owner. It is not used now. "Christine's Paploma - Christine's lovely, dusty-pink 'paploma' (quilt) was made by her mother, Maria Efstathis, during the 1950s in tiny El Arish, north Queensland. Christine is Maria and Eleftheri's third daughter and grew up as a typical Greek Australian, learning to move between her two cultures, helped, of course by her two older sisters, Ann and Anastasia; followed by brothers Stathis and Vlasis. Christine also has strong memories of her mother's paploma-making and along with this was Maria's insistence that all her daughters learn a variety of traditional needlework and handcraft skills; crochet, knitting, white cut-out embroidery. 'I got fed up with it; I used to pray for the 'yiortes' (religious holidays) to come along because we weren't allowed to sew on those days! But then again my daughter learnt it all'. In 1962 after the family moved to Brisbane QLD, Christine married Sozon Kyprios who grew up in Athens and whose parents were from the Greek island of Kythera. Christine and Sozon are still happily involved with their respective jobs in retailing and security.
Christine, as did her sisters, suffered from the patriarchal practice of educating only the boys in a family, so she insisted on equal educational opportunities for their two children; Maria is a pharmacist and George an accountant. Much to Christine's delight, both have followed in their parents' footsteps in being strongly Greek Australian. And somehow Christine's paploma, made all those years ago in a village in north Queensland, symbolises these two worlds, so familiar to a large number of Australians."
[Written by Lula Saunders, adapted from interview 6 September 2000 for the National Quilt Register]

Description

Wholecloth quilt made from dusty pink brocade with an all-over large leaf pattern. It is all hand stitched with quilting of parallel lines forming the border. Both sides are the same material. The padding is cotton wool.
2060 x 1770mm