Perhaps we are automatically going back to the roots of quilting. Our guild had a lecturer (with lots of examples) and she had spent a lot of time researching quilting. The first quilting was simply patching. At some point it evloved into if you have to patch, why not make it beautiful? At some very later date deliberate design were started. We are simply going back to the roots of quilting!
Probaby the economic crisis is influencing us. How many of us recyle? Not because we "need" to, but because it helps us have a cleaner world. Why do we use up our scrapes? Many of us have huge stashes and could make "designed" quilts out of what we have, but the awareness that times are hard, that fabric prices are going up, and, of course, the beautiful scrappies we see others doing makes us want to do what our ancestors did long ago.... be thrifty and have fun using the pieces we have on hand. Even those who buy fat quarters for scrappies are influenced by the history, the "feel" of making quilts our of small pieces.