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New Products From The Houston Quilt Festival

Summary

One of the most exciting parts of the Houston Quilt Festival is searching the aisles for new products and ideas.  Here are two of the ones I found most interesting in 2021.

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New Products From The Houston Quilt Festival

Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door. This is what some vendors at the Houston Quilt Festival were aiming for this year. I am confident that they missed Quilt Market where they would have had the opportunity to show their new ideas to quilt shops.

New Products From The Houston Quilt Festival

 

This article will cover two of those new products in the hope that both the quilt shops and quilters who read this will have a chance to explore them further.

 

Batting comes in cotton, polyester, wool, bamboo, and combinations of those materials. I saw a new product that attracted much attention. It is a batting which has a layer of 100% cotton batting and a layer of 100% cotton flannel. The makers say that the flannel acts like the flannel on your design wall. The front and backing of the quilt both stick to it and make pinning and basting unnecessary. The makers say that the product is perfect for any project of any size. I watched this at their booth as they smoothed the quilting fabric onto the batting. They sell by the yard and plan to have pre-packaged sizes coming.

flannel

 

Flannel was originally made of wool and is characterized by its napped finish on one or both sides. Napped finish means "fuzzy" which gives the fabric its soft feel and adherent quality. Sources say that flannel has been made since the 17th century and likely originated in Wales.

 

 

There is nothing new about 108 inch quilt backings and I’m sure that I’m not the only one who loves it. Not only do I always get a backing big enough for most quilts, but I get lots of scraps for making other quilts, borders, and bindings.

backing

 

The 108 inch booth in Houston had about 90 styles and colors of 108 inch fabric. I loved the different patterns of the tone on tone fabrics that she had.

 

What was new is that she is now selling a 5" x 108" cut of fabric. This can be used for a 5 x 108 border or cut to make one 2 inch and one 3 inch border. It can also be cut in half to make two strips of 2 1/2 inch binding. I was thrilled at the idea of not having to cut all those borders and bindings!

roll

 

Please excuse the color of the rolls that I bought. Hubby is making a National Parks quilt and this brown just went beautifully with the map and fabrics. It can supply the sashing as well as a border. I wanted to buy a lifetime supply of white rolls for borders, but instead Hubby and I bought a white on white 108 x 108 package just for the purpose of having lots of background fabric on hand.

 

Resources

Birdie Bird Batting. Birdiebirdquilts.com

108 Quilt Backings. 108quiltbackings.com

 

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Check out the most popular tool on QuiltingHub. Use the search 'Map Of Resources' or the 'Resources Trip Planner' to the right (or below).

 

Glossary

Background Fabric
The fabric used as the background when placing Applique pieces.
Backing
The fabric on the back of a Quilt Sandwich (Top, Batting and Backing).

Same As: Lining
Basting
A temporary method of holding the quilt Sandwich layers together while you finish assembling it. This can be conducted using Basting Sprays, pins, clips or temporary stitching called a Tacking Stitch or Basting Stitch.
Batting
The layer in the middle of a quilt sandwich between the Top and Backing layers consisting of wool, polyester, blends, silk, or cotton.

Same As: Stuffing, Filling, Wadding, Filler
Binding
Binding is used as both a noun and a verb. As a noun it is the fabric that's used to cover the raw edges of the quilt sandwich after it's quilted. This edging fabric is referred to as the Binding (noun). As a verb it is the process of putting on this fabric, and it referred to as Binding a Quilt.
Border
A strip of fabric or pieced strip of fabric joined to the edges of the inner quilt and used to frame it.
Design Wall
Any wall where you can position quilt blocks, then step back to view the layout at a distance. Quilters often hang batting or plain white flannel on their design walls, because quilt blocks and other components stick to it easily without pinning. Heavier commercial design walls are available.
Flannel
A soft fabric which can be made from cotton, wool or synthetic fibers. It is usually loosely woven and slightly furry and is very warm. It's tendency to ravel makes it a very good fabric to use for rag quilt.
Sashing
Fabric that separates the patterns or blocks, framing them and making the quilt larger.

See Also: Strip
Tone on Tone
Refers to a printed fabric that is made by combining different shades and tones of the same color. These fabrics often appear to be solid when viewed from a distance, but their printed motifs become recognizable on closer inspection.
Author
Debi Warner
Author and humorist, Debi Warner, retired after many years as a clinical librarian and information specialist. She has her Master’s in Library and Information Science and achieved a Distinguished level in the Medical Library Association’s Association of Health Information Professionals. She has worked on teaching physicians to use computers and electronic resources. She also worked on several grants teaching the public how to use the National Library of Medicine’s MedlinePlus public database and is co-author of several articles on health literacy. She took up quilting after retirement in 2012 and chaired the Rio Grande Valley Quilt Show in 2019. She currently teaches several quilting classes over Zoom and writes for QuiltingHub.
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