kitchen Archives - Vintage Living, Modern Life

Completed 1940s fan patchwork potholder. Brown fabric forms the bottom half of each fan blade and a brown and yellow batik fabric forms the top. It hangs upside down from a fabric loop against a gray brick wall.

Redecorating a room is a fun and exciting project. You pick out the paint, the furnishings, the floor cover. Then you set to work. But what if you have no money for a major remodel? In the 1930s and 40s, few had the spare funds for complete overhauls each year or two as the fashion changed. However, fabric gave homeowners one easy way to redecorate. In the kitchen nothing gave as much versatility as the humble potholder. Today we explore one possibility with the patchwork fan potholder.

During the Depression and for years afterward, crafters reveled in using every scrap of material so nothing went to waste. Little scraps of fabric became appliqué decorations on curtains, tablecloths, and dinner or luncheon napkins. Or they might find their way onto the corner of an apron or a handkerchief. Some scraps became part of that larger mosaic we call patchwork.

Illustration of 1940s patchwork fan potholders showing the two pattern pieces and two finished fans. — This is the majority of the instructions for this project.

In the Thirties and Forties, needleworkers loved to make potholders. These were also known as pan holders. Potholders made great pickup work. This means that the worker could grab the project, or pick it up, during spare moments through the day or week. In fact, I finished the trim on this one while I was waiting for the morning coffee to reach a boil in the percolator.

Use the Cotton

When you make potholders, the fabric must be 100% cotton or you risk injuring yourself or someone else. Likewise, the lining needs to be 100% cotton batting, thick fabric layers, or a layer or two of Insul-Bright insulated batting. You can find it on Amazon here, if you don’t have access to it locally. These projects were designed for workers to use what they had on hand, without going to any extra expense. They were truly scrap projects.

It’s also a good idea to prewash your fabrics before you use them. Everything I used was a leftover from some other project, so it was all prewashed. You can see the strings on the dark brown fabric from being tumbled around a hot dryer. Potholders eventually end up in the laundry, and you don’t want yours to shrink.

Pair them up

Usually potholders appeared in pairs. With a pattern like today’s patchwork fan potholder, two fabrics usually switched places in the design. You can see that in the red pattern sketch, which dates from the 1940s. The polka-dotted fan plumes of one potholder become the ribs of the other.

This is a pattern I’ve had for a long time and always wanted to try. It was part of a stash from my husband’s grandmother. The pattern took up a tiny section of a large transfer sheet of embroidery patterns, and it caught my eye the first time I saw it.

I happened to have some tiny scraps of brown and batik that would work great together, so that’s what I used. First, I traced the pattern from the sheet. Usually these large sheets were designed to be cut. Then they were placed design side down onto fabric and ironed.

However, the way this pattern was placed makes it obvious that it was a trace-to-use pattern, even though nothing says that. The pieces overlap enough that cutting each one out to use them would be impossible.

The Instructions

The original instructions for this project included the red and white illustration above, plus these terse commands:

These fan shaped pan holders can be made from any scraps of fabric you have available.
Piece, pad, bind, and quilt.

That was it. Beyond that you’re on your own. So I thought I’d make one and give an idea how it goes together.

You can see from the sketch that the potholder is supposed to use six fan pieces. Well, I can’t count, apparently, because I cut and used seven. First I hand-sewed the two pieces of each fan blade together.

Each blade is sewn together on the diagonal in the middle, like the photo below. Sew right sides together and then press the seam toward the wide end.

Once all the pieces were assembled, I sewed them side by side and found another scrap of fabric to use as a backing.

Patchwork fan potholder in two shades of brown, lying on a brown piece of fabric that will serve as the backing. — Yep. Just big enough to use as a backing piece.

I cut around the fan and used the backing piece as a pattern to cut the lining.

Finishing Up

I sandwiched the three pieces together, and ran a stitch 3/8″ from the edge around all the edges. I used a sewing machine for this part, although you could easily do it by hand.

Then, because terry cloth tends to move while it’s squashed between two pieces of fabric, I had some edges to neaten before attaching the bias binding.

I made the binding myself from another scrap of brown fabric that I cut into 1 1/4″ diagonal strips and then sewed together. First I pinned the bias tape to the front of the fan and then sewed around it using a 1/4″ seam allowance. I started at the fan’s point. That way I could end there with a loop of extra bias tape that I then secured to the back of the fan with a few solid stitches.

Once the bias tape was attached to the front, I turned it over. Folding the tape over the raw edge, I sewed it down by hand all around the edge of the fan. This is what I did while the coffee brewed. When I got back to my starting point I cut off the bias tape, leaving a couple inches on the end. I turned under a little bit at the very end, and then folded it together and whipped the long open edges to make it a tube. Then I bent it into a loop and sewed the end onto the back of the fan at the point.

This makes its own hanging loop so I don’t have to hunt for crochet thread or a wooden ring.

Finally, I hand quilted all three layers together. Of course, you could use a sewing machine for any or all of this.

Now You Make One!

Here’s a copy of the pattern so that you can make yourself a pair of fan potholders (or pan holders, as you prefer.) I traced the pattern onto one 8.5 x 11 inch sheet of paper, and it took about half of it. This is not a large pattern.

Pattern pieces for a 1940s patchwork fan potholder. — The two pattern pieces for the fan potholder

I’ll dig out the fabric scraps I have left from this project and make another potholder to coordinate with the first one. I really enjoyed making this little patchwork fan potholder and I hope you make one or two to add a bit of Forties Flair to your kitchen.

Green knit potholder and white baking dish. Link leads to potholder pattern. — Give your kitchen a Fifties flair with this easy to knit vintage potholder pattern.

Depending when and where you live, you may call this a pan holder like they did in the Fifties. You might call it a potholder, a trivet, a hot dish mat, or something else. No matter what you call it, it’s adorable and it’s pretty easy to make.

Creating from old patterns is a lot of fun. With a little time and effort you can have something just like Grandma or Great-grandma had. However, it does take some tweaking. Sometimes needle sizes are different. Often fabrics are no longer made. And usually, yarns must be substituted because the yarns a particular pattern calls for is long out of production.

Take rug yarn, for instance. Rug yarn used to be made from wool or cotton. No fillers, nothing but wool or cotton. Now the closest thing we can find to old fashioned rug yarn is chunky weight knitting yarn, and it doesn’t have the same texture, weight, or strength that rug yarn of the 1930s – 1950s had. Plus, it’s very rarely made from anything but acrylic.

WARNING: You CANNOT use acrylic, nylon, or any type of polyester yarn when making potholders. Acrylic yarn is plastic. Nylon yarn is plastic. When plastic melts, it can cause nasty burns. ONLY 100% cotton or 100% wool can be used for kitchen pads that need to protect from heat.

You can make a table hot dish mat from acrylic yarn as long as you never, ever grab it when you need to pull a hot pan from the oven, or to tame a hot pot handle on the stove. I have ONE table pad that I made from acrylic yarn and a 1970s pattern. It’s dorky, in seafoam green and white, and I love it. But it’s never used as a potholder to hold anything hot. It goes on the table and then I reach for the potholders that I’ve knitted from 100% cotton. Someday, when I have the time, I’ll replace that dorky 1970s acrylic table mat with a nice set of 100% cotton table mats using a 1930s or 1940s pattern. Then I’ll tell you all about it so you can make them, too.

The Quick Knit 1950s Potholder

This potholder knits a little strangely because you are using one “strand” of yarn (I’ll get to that in a minute) to produce a thick, cushioned protector for your hand.

Photo of half knitted potholder, a partial ball of yarn, and a cone of yarn, all bright green. — This is what the potholder looks like in process. I had a full pound of this bright green Sugar ‘n Cream cotton yarn available, so green potholder it is!

Note: You may want to make two of these. Often cooks reached for two pan holders at a time, and used them double to protect against one handle in the oven, especially if they were thin and made from fabric. I tested this finished potholder in a 420 degree oven and it protected my hand well. You may feel comfortable using one, or more at ease when using two together.

The pattern called for 1950s rug yarn, of course. Rug yarn like this is unfortunately no longer made. I substituted the yarn and increased the size of the knitting needles a bit, and it worked really well.

Instead of rug yarn I used two strands of Lily Sugar ‘n Cream cotton worsted yarn, held together as if they were one strand. This is a bit stiffer than rug yarn. It is less pliable. But it does construct a nice thick hotpad.

You will Need

One skein Sugar ‘n Cream 100% cotton worsted weight yarn.

One pair size 7 (4.5 mm) knitting needles, preferably aluminum or steel. Plastic or wood needles can break when you knit with two strands of cotton worsted weight yarn, but you’re welcome to try if that’s what you have and what you enjoy using.

One size G (4 – 4.25 mm) crochet hook for the loop (optional).

Making the Item

In order to use today’s worsted cotton yarn instead of rug yarn, you need to knit with two strands. The easiest way to do this is to 1) either buy two balls of yarn if you plan to make several small things, or 2) find the center of the ball of yarn and pull from both the center and the outside of the ball at the same time, using two strands. One strand comes from the center of the ball, and the other strand comes from the end wrapped around the outside of the ball.

This pattern uses a familiar stitch in an unfamiliar way. You will be working yarn-overs, but instead of passing the yarn over the needle as you usually do, this pattern requires you to bring the yarn all the way around the needle: between the stitches, up, and over. If you knit Continental style (also called picking the yarn), it looks like this:

Hands holding knitting, showing how to do a modified yarn over stitch. — How to do a special yarn over for this pattern if you knit Continental style. The yarn goes to the back and around the needle toward the front.

Hands holding knitting, showing how to knit two stitches together. — This is what a knit 2 together looks like after the modified yarn over stitch, if you knit Continental style.

And if you knit English style (also known as throwing the yarn) it looks like this:

Two hands showing how to make a long yarn over stitch in knitting. — How to do the special yarn over for this pattern, if you knit English style.

Hands holding knitting and showing how to knit two together, English style. — And this is what a knit two together looks like after that modified yarn over, if you knit English style.

The Pattern

The completed potholder measures about six inches (15 mm) square. The knitting is pretty tight with doubled yarn and the small knitting needle size. If you knit more loosely, your potholder will be larger – and it may not offer as much protection as a tightly knitted one.

Abbreviations:
K: Knit
P: Purl
sl: Slip 1 stitch while holding the yarn in the front as if you are going to purl.
YO: Yarn over. In this pattern only, the yarn will be in front of the needles since your last stitch was either a purl stitch or a slipped stitch with the yarn in front of your work. You pass the yarn from the front to the back and then up and around, as you see in the photos above. This makes the potholder extra thick. If you don’t wrap the yarn this way, the potholder will NOT be thick enough to protect your hand. The thickest part of this piece should be nearly 3/8-inch, or 1 centimeter.
( ): When you see something in parentheses, you do that thing over and over as many times as the instructions say. It may say twice, or three times, or 6 times.
[ ]: Extra instructions or reminders you might find helpful.

Cast on 26 stitches. (change to 26 sts)
Row 1: P 1, sl 1, and repeat across the row. [Remember to slip the stitches with the yarn in front, as if you are purling.]
Row 2: P each stitch across.
Row 3: Sl 1, P 1, and repeat across the row.
Row 4: P each stitch across.
Row 5: (P 1, sl 1) twice, K 18, (P 1, sl 1) twice.
Row 6: P 4, (YO, sl 1, P 1) 9 times, then P 4. [Remember to make the YO as the instructions and photos above.]
Row 7: (Sl 1, P1) twice, (sl 1, YO, P2 together) 9 times, (sl 1, P 1) twice. [The two stitches that you purl together will be a normal stitch and one of the yarn overs.]
Row 8: P 5, (sl the YO, P 2) 8 times, sl 1, P 5.
Row 9: (P1, sl 1) twice, (P2 together, sl 1, YO) 9 times, (P1, sl 1) twice.
Row 10: P4, (sl the YO, P2) 8 times, sl 1, P 6.

Repeat rows 7 through 10 seven times.

Row 39: (Sl 1, P 1) twice, (K 1, K 2 together) 6 times, (sl 1, P 1) twice.
Row 40: P each stitch.
Row 41: P 1, sl 1, repeat across row.
Row 42: P each stitch.
Row 43: Sl 1, P 1, repeat across row.
Bind off in purl stitch.

If you want a ring to hang it from:
After binding off the final stitch, using the crochet hook, chain 10 stitches.
Join the stitches together to form a ring at the corner of the potholder.
Finish off and hide the ends.

Now you have your very own 1950s potholder! Use it to decorate your kitchen or to protect your hands from hot pans.

Tag: kitchen

Patchwork Fan Potholder