To Use, or Not To Use Batting?

Do I actually have to use batting? The simple answer is no. Historically, quilts made for use during the summer weather, without any type of batting or "filling", were referred to as summer quilts and were made to keep the cool night air away. Even though these summer quilts did not have the traditional finished quilting method used - as in layering a quilt top with batting and a backing, and then quilting them together – we still fondly refer to them as quilts.

Quilt batting was known as wadding and was used for warmth in a quilt. Wadding made a quilt warm, cozy, and sometimes could even be quite heavy. Wadding was often made up from any type of filler that a quilter could find at the time. Antique quilts have been discovered to have fillers made from animal hair, human hair, straw, wadded up clothing scraps, unusable sheets, army blankets, and even newspapers! When unusual types of wadding were used, the quilt had to be very densely quilted to keep the wadding from . . . wadding up. As a side note - the word wadding is still used by those in the United Kingdom and Australia.

The wadding used for bedding in the early years of America was almost always wool. It was easily accessible since sheep were often quite plentiful and most families owned sheep. The wool was shorn, cleaned and then layered in chunks between the quilt layers. The sheep's wool was not woven into wool batting as we know it today because any actual woven wool would have been used for clothing or on the quilt top itself. Wool batting was used well into the 20th century. Many quilts made in the eras of the thirties and the forties used the weathered wool army blanket of a family's soldier once the wars were over.

Cotton wadding was not as easily accessible in the northern part of the country as it was in the south. But then the south didn't have the need for heavily batted quilts, hence – the summer quilt! And if cotton wadding was used in a southern quilt, it was usually used in thin layers for those cool winter evenings. Just like wool wadding, the cotton used between quilt layers was often not woven together into the batting we know today. It wasn't until much later during the industrial age that wadding, or batting, began to be woven into large sections to be sold for quilting purposes.

Today, we have the convenience of choosing from a variety of batting to fill our quilts. Everything from cotton, polyester, wool, silk, blends, organic, and even bamboo. Wool batting is the heaviest and warmest, while bamboo is the lightest. You'll find that batting comes in white, cream, natural, and black colors.

You can also find batting in different "lofts". The word "loft" refers to the thickness of the batting, or the height of the batting. Use a low loft batting for items like wall hangings or table runners. Likewise, use a higher loft batting for a downy-look or comforter-look quilt. Quilting with a polyester high-loft batting will give your quilt a very definite full look when it is quilted. Quilting with a thinner batting allows a quilter to make tight, small designs over the entire quilt and is quite often the favorite amongst long-arm quilters.