Borders by Charal Quilts

Title: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: charalquilts on February 20, 2008, 01:55:41 PM
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I've been told never to piece your boarders.....but then again a few folks have said that once the quilting is done it really won't matter....What your opinion?


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: QBee - Mary Ann on February 20, 2008, 02:09:39 PM
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Hmmm - one of the less experienced is making the first reply. What nerve, huh??I think much depends on how much of a perfectionist one is and the purpose of the quilt. The quilts I'm making are to be used and loved, not entered in competitions. I piece my borders to save on fabric, and I'm perfectly satisfied with how they look. It will be interesting to hear what the experienced quilters have to say. QBee


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: quiltermarynel on February 20, 2008, 02:20:04 PM
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I am not sure exactly what you mean here.

Quilt pro and many TV quilt shows assume that even a plain border is cut lengthwise on the fabric so it is all one piece on each side. I have done that.....once or twice. I suspect that one needs to if one is entering a major competition. Usually, I piece. The theory is that there is less stretch in a lengthwise cut and for the person who leeks really closely, it looks better. I tend to do border quilting, such as vines, waves and feathers, so my border fabrics take a back seat to the quilting. No judge has ever made a negative comment on my borders.

I do "pieced borders", that is, borders with their own pieced pattern, from time to time.


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: quiltbrain on February 21, 2008, 05:59:35 AM
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I usually piece my borders. It saves on fabric, and I'm not sure how much difference it makes. A lot of books give directions for piecing the borders. I agree with Marynel that if it is a quilt intended for competition, that unpieced borders would look better.


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: Merry Bee on February 21, 2008, 06:18:37 AM
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I always piece my borders, too. Believe me, nobody in my immediate family knows the difference, and they are pleased as punch with my quilts. If I ever got to the point that I thought I could win a prize in a competition, I might buy enough fabric to make whole lengthwise cuts for borders, but for now, we are just using my quilts for comfort and warmth. When they are quiltedd, you don't see the seams, you see the quilting design.


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: charalquilts on February 21, 2008, 09:19:29 AM
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Thanks ladies, I have only not pieced one quilt....it was one of my first quilts; my underground railroad quilt that I completed in a class. I have since decided to save some fabric and as DH says the folks you are giving this quilt to won't even notice. I also agree that the quilting design outshines the border fabric. I am putting a one border an infant quilt and decided to find out if I was in the majority.....


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: TxMaryQuilts on February 21, 2008, 09:29:29 AM
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My line of thought runs like this--I have chopped everything else into pieces and sewed them back together, so why not the border. :D


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: finisher on February 21, 2008, 01:07:14 PM
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I usually piece the border to save on fabric unless I'm using a printed fabric that would look funny where the join is. I don't think the join is unsightly..especially since the quilting makes it "disappear".


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: tlcquiltnut on February 21, 2008, 02:03:22 PM
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I agree with all the others. I peice too as long as it is a diagonal piecing. It does save on fabric, if you can do that there will be more money left for stash....lol ;D


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: quiltermarynel on February 21, 2008, 02:51:06 PM
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Please notice that I said Major competition. I have wond lots of prizes in our local show with pieced borders. I think it only matters if you are going for the really big shows. One of our judges commented that we have one of 2 local shows in our state that have really tight competition, so it's pretty tough for a local show. I can think of only 3 quilts that I did continuous borders on. All three had border fabrics.


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: sewnsew on February 22, 2008, 07:25:10 AM
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I also piece my borders unless using a pattern that says cut borders first. :)


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: quilton on February 22, 2008, 07:57:00 PM
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I piece my borders all the time. We pay about $14-$16 a metre ( that's 3" more than a yard) in Canada and when you pay that much you piece! I could never convince myself to buy that extra amount of fabric just for a border.


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Title: Re: borders - what do you think?????
Post by: Merry Bee on February 22, 2008, 08:33:52 PM
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The idea of quilts was to utilize bits and left over pieces of fabric to make bedding. I think it is impractical to buy lengths of fabric just for borders. Unless you are into competition, big atime. But, I have made quilts that needed a lot of fabric in one or two colors, and sometimes you can cut the borders first, and then the patchwork pieces afterwards from the rest of the cut. That works.

Okay, everyone, come back! I have a Nother question and I need a hundred answers!

WHEN you piece your borders, do you cut and sew a straight seam, or a diagonal one?

I sew straight. If you cut and sew on the diagonal it takes a little more fabric. I've seen it done both ways though.

It depends how wide the border is. If it is skiiny, cay no more than 2.5 in I do a diagonal seam as it doesn't sahow up as much. If it is any wider I use a straight seam. :-)

I don't worry about sewing strips together to make borders. When I do my quilting, I often do some sort of pattern on the borders, such as a wave, a "feather" or a leafy vine, so any seams tend to disappear from view.

quiltermarynel wrote:

I don't worry about sewing strips together to make borders. When I do my quilting, I often do some sort of pattern on the borders, such as a wave, a "feather" or a leafy vine, so any seams tend to disappear from view.

...but when you DO sew them together, how do you do it? Straight or diagonally?

I mostly do on the diagonal. I don't know why, I just do. I think I do it that way because that is how I do strips for my binding so I just kinda automatically do all strips that way.

You know, this is kind of an official poll :)

I count on you all to give me straight opinions!

We were having a pattern meeting yesterday and just got one of those moments. Two of the three of us piece borders diagonally, the other partner pieces straight. We diagonal piecers just looked at one another - it never occurred to us that anyone would do it differently. Well, actually, I don't think either one of us ever gave it any thought!

The whole point of that conversation was in figuring yardage for the border in a new pattern. The outer border on the queen size is 6" finished (and that reminds me of another question) and if we allow for diagonal piecing there's a significant increase in the fabric requirement.

So, that's that. Keep those opinions coming (and thank you!)

Now, for that other question - my very, very good friend who is even more math-y than I am (I know! Can you believe it???). If we have a quilt border that is cut at 6 1/2", she maintains that the border is then 6 1/4" wide on the finished quilt. I guess I'm not so particular - I figure you cut at 6 1/2, you finish at 6. Binding doesn't count into the border width. Anyone care to translate her completely foreign concept to me?

And another thing - I think I might be the last person on the planet to make a binding bigger than 1/4". Another round and round "discussion" that I just had to let go. :lipssealed:

Well, here's my opinion (and I'm sticking to it ) I cut my borders on the diagonal and I cut my binding strips on the diagonal. My binding finishes about 1/2". I most always buy a few more inches of fabric than the pattern calls for.
How else are you going to keep the scrap box full .

Tracy, If you are talking about Mitered corners in borders, those are what I like. If you're talking about piecing borders - as in - don't have enough length and have to piece it somewhere - I would cut it straight. Just my preference.

I don't get the reasoning either on including the binding in the width of border. The binding is a separate width to me.

There is a real tidal wave of 1/4" bindings isn't there? I haven't seen anything wider than 3/8" in a while. They do look neat on a lot of quilts but some would look better wider. IMHO

All of this is preference and idiosyncrasy. Nothing is really right or wrong just takes all kinds to make a world, huh? It's funny how strong our opinions are isn't it?

As to the width of the border...if it's cut at 6 1/2"..and your friends agrees that it's going to be 1/4" narrower because of the seam used when adding it to the quit top..she has to concede that you're going to lose at least 1/4" of that border to the seam of the binding as well. If she doesn't get it. Take a piece of paper cut at 6 1/2"..draw a line down one side where it would join to the quilt if it were fabric. Then..draw the seam where binding would attach..then measure the space between those lines.

I used to make my bindings wider, but the trend started towards narrower..and that uses less fabric too..so that's what I do. I'm a bit of a miser!

I don't piece the borders on lap size or smaller quilts. I generally do piece borders on twins and up. I always use length of goods and piece diagonally. I think a diagonal seam is much less noticeable. I agree that quilting and applique on the border will disguise the seam.
My bindings are generally 3/8"...but I have made them larger being sure that I leave the batting so it is full.
A border cut to 6 1/2 inches will give you a 6" border. The binding is a separate entity, not part of the border.

Okay, I feel better, I'm not totally in left field (about this, at least!).

Loretta, the question was about making borders long enough, not mitering corners - thanks for answering both (mitered corners are another thing that is 'unusual' these days, aren't they?).

I reached a point in the binding discussion (1/4 vs anything else) that I was just so frustrated that I dug out a dozen or so books and looked at their little section about applying binding. All of the books I looked at did 1/4" bindings (double-fold) but all of the books did NOT have you cut the binding fabric at the same width. It went from 2 1/8-2 3/4". I didn't stop to figure out why there was such a discrepancy, but that's weird.

It looks like the 1/4" binding is so that you can cut the backing and batting even with the edge of the quilt. I have always sewn the binding on before trimming the batting and backing, then trimmed from the seam line. Don't know where I learned to do bindings - must have been SOME book. That's also the way I teach in my Beginner's Classes.

:peek: Back to our regularly-scheduled discussion:

If you are a diagonal piecer AND if you're actually following a pattern, do you ever run out of fabric?
Or do you routinely buy more?
Do you buy more because you always buy more, or do you actually do it because you know you're going to be doing the diagonal piecing?

And here's a new one:
Straight or diagonal, do you press your seams in the pieced border to one side or open?

I always buy more fabric than I need if I know ahead of time what project I'll be using it on. Unfortunately sometimes I just pull fabric from my stash and have to use what's there. It seems most of the time I'm cutting it pretty close on the amount I have. Just one more reason why I use the straight seam. I always press those seams open because I hand quilt and don't want to deal with the bulk.

I always buy more to compensate for diagonals, boo boos (#1 reason). and because I like it and want extra for my stash.

I press to one side.

Woo whoo, I wanted to know when cutting a border is there a preference to the size you should cut it at? Ok, for instance I am sewing along on my Basket and Blooms quilt. I decided to match the Red Sashing with a border. Then add a border around it. The sashing is 2/12 in strips, so I also had enough fabric to cut 4 more 2 1/2 inch strips and framed it...now the pattern didn't call for the extra small border and called for 4 1/2 in strips instead for the border. Should I increase the border to be maybe a 6 1/2 in strip then? See the pattern Here. What do you think should I increase it or leave it at the 4 1/2?

Schnookie, in my world (hahahahah - it's a straaaange place at times...) the border is related to the size of the block.

It looks like your blocks are 8" wide, so each of your borders, no matter how many you use, should be an even portion of the block width. In other words, make however many borders you want, but keep them in 2, 4 or 8" widths. *I* think that if you ended up with a 5 or 7" border it would look not right, though you or others who viewed it wouldn't necessarily know WHY it wasn't right.

So, if you've done a 2" finished size inner border, you can leave it, add a 4" border or a 6" border (I know, 6" doesn't go evenly into 8", but added to the 2" gives you 8" finished). I'd do the 6" border... which is what you said in the first place!

I wouldn't go over 8" total in the border for such a small quilt, and it's just one of my quirks that 2 neighboring borders need to be different sizes. (No 2+2+4... I'd do 1+2+1+4 if I really wanted to get carried away)

I got strictly by what looks good to me. I like double and triple borders. But to answer your question, one of those TV queens of quilting said that the border should be an even divisor of the blaoc size (assuming a regular block) Thus, a 12" (finished) block would have border(s) of 1/2", 1", 2", 3" 4" or 6", but not 5". However, if I do have an inner border, I do NOT count it as a part of the border measure.

All these quilters' design rules, however, are a way of explaining what your gut tells you will work ...or not. Sometimes my border is a border fabric. I am not going to cut that down to fit an arbitrary rule.

If it is MY quilt. I do it MY way. period.

Very cute quilt Schnookie.....I don't have an answer but I'm interested in the question. I have wondered too is there a rule of thumb on that.
Charal, I iron to the side so I have a ditch to quilt in. I know what you mean by the bulk and hand quilting. I hand quited my first quilt and ran into trouble several times.

Yeah, what FB said.

Thanks it is so nice to talk things over and bounce ideas and thoughts off other quilters...I think I will go with the 6 inch outer border. Cut at 6 1/2 right, right! Finish block 8 in, inner border finish 2 in, and outer border finished 6 in...right?

Yup, and I agree. That's what you started with when you first asked - maybe you should just trust your own judgement

But it is sure nice to have the conversation!

Yeah, I lack in that apartment (my own judgment) that is for sure. Sometimes I get it right away and other times I just am not sure of myself. go figure!