John Flynn's Diagonal backing calculator helps to minimize the amount of fabric needed for your quilt backing. Free Shipping on domestic orders $49+ and free returns. The back of your quilt should be about 3-4” larger all around than the top of the quilt. She thought the backing fabric was large enough.I will keep this in mind. I work with a 24″ x 36″ mat however—while it isn’t exactly tiny, you can’t cut huge backing-sized pieces of fabric on it. If I had a set of those ginormous cutting mats in my studio, I might be a bit more precise and exacting when I cut my… Let me know if this is helpful, or if you have questions! …and then in half again, and pin. Lay the batting and the quilt top on the backing with the sides of the quilt top parallel to the selvedges of the backing and baste. Sew It Together. Get ready for a ton of illustrations! PRESS the four corners in so the point of the backing fabric touches the point of the project, but doesn’t overlap. I have shied away from backing construction and have favoured wide backing material, but the selection isn’t too exciting, I know. Hi Valentina! I can give you a method to make it a little easier. Quilt As You Go Tutorial. Sew your blocks, in any technique you want. When you get to a corner, fold the corner up like so…. I try to take advantage of the show-through by using a fleece print that harmonizes with the colors on the front. You will quilt the project as desired prior to finishing the binding. This means if the length of your top, plus the 4” top and bottom, adds up to less than 90" (45”x2)then you could use two widths of fabric. My first quilting teacher in 1994 (who did not believe in rotary cutting…) also taught us to rip, from blocks to sashing… Yep, this was my intro to quilting. My crazy accuracy freak girl twin would have a fit! I really like how the torn edges create a really flat seam allowance. How to add batting to a quilt; how to add backing to a quilt, and ; how to bind a quilt. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. If it’s that far off of being straight, will the quilt hang straight in the end? I think it looks prettier if it appears that you put some effort into choosing a complimentary back. It should be preshrunk if the quilt top fabrics were. Very pretty quilt. 1.4k. Here’s where the fun begins! It simplifies quilting for beginners because it is an easy way to join quilted pieces by machine. Thanks so much. Sometimes it gets flipped over, or scrunched somehow and the back shows. Instead of cutting two separate pieces of fabric and sewing them together, you cut one long piece, fold it together and then sew right down one side. The one problem I have, however, with every quilt I make, is the fact that it is awful hard to machine quilt on j… A good idea is to use fabrics from the same collection. Jul 17, 2016 - After Kathy's great and precise tutorial at Pink Chalk Studio, this one probably seems a bit slap-dash, but hey, there's always more than one way to go about it! The bold and funky Bayside quilt pattern is available in the pattern shop! And with so many step-by-step photos, this is arguably the best tutorial on FineCraftGuild. How to fix puckered quilt backing : I run into some problems with my badly puckered quilt back and I thought I’ll share with you a short tutorial on how to fix it . I can’t decide whether that’s supposed to be a swimsuit or a fancy bra and panties, so I think I’ll leave it open to interpretation! Valentina. 4- fold the backing fabric 1/4″ 5- fold the backing fabric again 1/4″ 6- stitch along the edge to secure the binding Shop Quilt Backing and Extra Wide fabric at Fabric.com! Place the ruler on the fabric, leaving the fold showing and trim off a slither (about 1/8″) to cut the pieces. Having said that, I confess that I do break my own rules sometimes by not purchasing nice co-ordinating fabric for a back. Some quilters also like to piece the quilt backing, using the left over fabric from the front. Pin the lengthwise torn edges together; it’s good to lay the two chunks on a cutting mat or table so that they’re flat when pinning. I like to start about 18 inches from the bottom corner. This technique produces a double-sided quilt; if you want to use both sides, plan ahead what to use as backing for your blocks. Keep the tutorials coming! Your back should also be bigger than the quilt top which makes quilting much easier. The reason for this, is that a quilt gets most of its wear down the center and a seam there will wear faster. When shopping for quilt backing some people like to purchase inexpensive fabric, or plain muslin for the backing of their quilts. 124 Responses to “Quick and Easy T-Shirt Quilt Tutorial” Debra Frease December 29th, 2016 . …then fold the next edge in half…. this quilt is the first (i hope) in my BurdensToBlessings series. Nadine, does this mean you only have one seam down the middle of your backing? It’s helpful to use a backing piece that is approximately 2.5” longer and wider than a mug rug top, or 3″ wider on all four sides of a quilt to make centering it easier. Here are the steps you need to follow. In other words the seam you sewed will run across from side to side of your quilt. Now, we’re going to cut the backing. So, I occasionally "use up" bits and pieces for the quilt backing, and unfortunately I'm not always happy with the result. Trust me, it won’t matter one bit later, but pressing now is good for ease of construction. Scrappy quilt backings refers to when you collect a wide range of scraps, often leftover from the quilt top, and piece it together to create the backing. if your quilt top is 70x85, add 8” each way making it 78x93, then you will need 93” times two, or 186”. The batting, obviously, is the meat of the sandwich, while the fabric top and back are the bread. This kind of backing involves sewing a lot of seams, perhaps even a leftover block or two, and a bit of puzzle work too! Kathy’s great and precise tutorial at Pink Chalk Studio, Accessorize Me–with Inchies! So you have given me courage to try something more adventurous. Cut along the diagonal line, to give two triangular pieces of fabric. The top is what we see, the batting is the padding in the middle, and the backing is the underside of the quilt, the one we get to see when we flip the quilt. 3- trim your backing fabric to 3/4″ from the quilt top. You may want to baste the layers lightly together with basting spray, but for a quilt this small, I usually don’t baste. And you build a sandwich so that you can quilt it! Quilt Backing Tutorial. This is okay as long as it is good quality fabric. So if this is your first quilt, you may want to use a background fabric that matches your quilt top in value—lightness or darkness— or in busy-ness. So here’s Nadine’s quick and dirty, rip-it-up backing tutorial: Tear the opposite selvedge from the other chunk of backing fabric, in other words, if you’ve torn off the selvedge with all the dots and fabric manufacturers marks from the first chunk, tear the selvedge without all those marks off the second chunk. An example would be my halloween quilt, which has a lot of one type of halloween fabric on it (see the my Quilt Gallery), but also has a section made up of great seasonal fat quarters which may never have been used on a quilt top. It’s likely that they won’t and it doesn’t matter anyway. It doesn’t matter if the quilt backing is perfectly square or rectangular, or has perfectly straight ends—you’re going to cut off all the edges later anyway when you trim up before binding. Center the quilt top on top of the batting with its right side up and smooth away wrinkles. This is workshop #8 in a series of workshops where art quilt designer Janeen van Niekerk shows us how to make a simple quilt. It kind of gradually fades awayon the sides, so that there’s not a bump on each side of the seam where the edge of the seam allowance is. First, if you don’t know, a quilt sandwich is nothing more than the pieced quilt top, the batting and the backing. You can do this on your ironing board and press it as you go…it makes it very simple. This is about the only time I tear fabric, and I’d never do it to actually piece a block or sashing or something. If I had a set of those ginormous cutting mats in my studio, I might be a bit more precise and exacting when I cut my backings. I can keep the torn edges lined up on that line on the bed of the machine this way, and more of the seam allowance is under the presser foot for easier sewing. See how I’ve moved the needle a bit to the left, so that the torn edges stick out to the right? If there’s a lot of excess backing fabric on the sides of the quilt sandwich, you can tear it off, leaving 3-4″ outside the quilt top on each side. Start by flipping the the binding over to the front of the quilt. I did think about getting those mats and adding another giant cutting table to the studio, but at the moment, I’m more in love with the floor space than I would be with more furniture in the room. You don't want the back of your quilt to wear out long before the top. Sew the torn edges together with about a ½” seam. This is true, especially if your top includes white or pale fabrics. Also included is a video tutorial on cutting those tricky templates AND a coloring … Third, apply basting spray to the back of the batting and center it on the backing piece. …talented… However, following a quarter of an inch was hard this way… So 1/2″ makes a lot more sense! 1. Although muslin is an inexpensive option for a quilt back, keep in mind that it shows every quilting detail and does little to enhance the beauty of your finished quilt. That’s a sneaky peek of the show quilt I’m working on right now. A quilt usually tends to have three layers sandwiched together; they are the quilt top, batting, and finally, the backing. Quilt As You Go Tutorial: The Easiest Way to Machine Quilt. Use our quilt backing fabric calculator to determine the perfect amount of fabric for backing your quilt. If your quilt top is longer than the width of the backing fabric (which, normally would be 45” or 60” unless you get actual quilt backing fabric) you will have to sew a seam down the center (as shown in the picture). Well, okay, that last step is shortened a bit, but that’s not part of this tutorial anyway! Pin or clip into place. I would purchase 5 1/2 yds or 4.8 m (186" divided by 36" for yard, or divided by 39" for meters. I do this all the time EXCEPT I use the seam to create some beautiful detail with fabric from the from of the quilt and I sew those pieced in between the seams. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. Don’t worry about whether both ends match up when you’re done pinning. Thank you for linking up to Put your foot down. RRRRIIIIPPPP! I usually measure the length of the quilt … Measure your quilt top from the top to the bottom, and add 6-8″. Take the yardage from step 3, and cut a small snip in the selvedge at the halfway point, and then rip the length of yardage in half crosswise, so that you have two chunks that are 6-8″ longer than your quilt top. Saved by Margaret Morgan. After Kathy’s great and precise tutorial at Pink Chalk Studio, this one probably seems a bit slap-dash, but hey, there’s always more than one way to go about it! Finishing A Quilt Part 2- Adding Batting and Backing - YouTube How to figure yardage for quilt backing: The back of your quilt should be about 3-4” larger all around than the top of the quilt. I actually prefer to choose a backing that co-ordinates with the top of the quilt. Partly, that’s to keep the tutorial simple, but also because I rarely do anything else these days. Yay! Loved the suit! This is what’s left, one selvedge with printing, one without, and a bunch of string bits: I know Jodie is out there salivating over the selvedge; I did save it Jodie, to start my collection so that I’ll be ready when you write that book! It saves you time because you don’t have to sew long pieces together, and if you are hand quilting you don’t have any extra seams to sew through. | DreamWeaver’s Quilts Quilt Epiphany Blog, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Now tear the selvedge from one side of one of the chunks—pick the printed selvedge side if there is one, so that you can keep track of the fabric print direction, especially if you’re working with a directional print and want both halves of the backing to be “right side up!” Just make a little snip into the fabric about ½-¾” in from the selvedge edge, and tear the whole selvedge off, like this: Press the fabrics, including all those torn edges, because they’ll all be a little ruffly and stretched at this point.