Mayor's Garden~Barn Quilt Trail, New Milford, CT

OLD TOBACCO BARN, Town Hall

Former Mayor Patricia Murphy, a longtime quilter and the original advocate of the New Milford Barn Quilt Trail, chose the quilt block design from Barbara Brackman’s Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns. Architectural details on the small barn suggest that this mid-to-late 19th-century structure was used in part for warehousing tobacco, a major industry in Connecticut at that time. These include reinforced posts under the summer beam, a boarded-up trapdoor that may have been used as an opening for a hoist, and shouldered supports that would have distributed the weight of the 300- to 500-pound cases of packed tobacco stores on the second floor.

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‍The New Milford Barn Quilt Trail consists of 19 colorful quilt patterns hand-painted on large weather-resistant blocks and hung on antique and vintage barns and historical buildings around our town. It honors our rich agricultural history, the exciting resurgence of family farms in New Milford today and the American tradition of quilt-making. It is the first barn quilt trail established in Connecticut. Already, over 40 U.S. states, including New Hampshire and New York, boast quilt trails in a rapidly expanding movement that began in Ohio in 2001. Get in your car or jump on your bike and use any mobile device to access this site as you visit these barn quilt block sites. Please use caution as you drive, bike or walk along the country roads of the barn quilt trail. Remember that the quilt blocks are displayed on what is often private property and can be viewed only from public roadsides. Responsibility for any accidents while observing the quilt blocks rests entirely with the viewer.

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