Waggas

The National Wool Museum holds one of Australia’s largest and most significant public collections of quilts and waggas. 
 

Quilts and waggas are equal parts history, handcraft, art, storytelling and good old fashion usefulness. Today, we recognise textile making is a tradition in excess of 60,000 years – from first people’s traditional techniques to cutting edge technologies.

  - Padraic Fisher - National Wool Museum Director

What is a wagga?

Born of necessity and the desperate times of the 1890s to 1930s, the wagga was the bushman’s blanket, made by pioneering men from old jute wheat sacks and wool bales. As it evolved, women replaced the rough jute sacks with calico flour bags, fabric swatches and bits of old clothes. The wagga embodies the ‘make-do’ Aussie spirit.

The Wagga Project was a project of the National Wool Museum to build and care for its significant collection of heritage quilts and waggas. We are passionate about textiles, about community and sharing our collective culture through storytelling.

The National Wool Museum Collection includes:

  • 45 quilts
  • 25 waggas
  • 11 Expressions: The Wool Quilt Prize winners
  • 2 rugs
  • 2 tapestries
  • 65 blankets

In the spirit of storytelling through quilt making, the National Wool Museum builds on the Collection through our programs, Expressions: The Wool Quilt Prize, the National Quilt Register, The Wagga Project and the Djillong Possum Skin Cloak Project. 

Learn more about the heritage quilts and waggas in the National Wool Museum Collection by reading Waggas and the Arts of Making Do in Australia - An essay by Padraic Fisher and Luke Keogh. Published by the National Wool Museum, Australia, October 2021.

The history of quilting (in 4 minutes)





Page last updated: Wednesday, 15 January 2025

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