BlueChicken

I've just been reading about someone picking up some fabrics for $3 a yard.

I nearly fell off my chair! We can only dream of those sorts of prices here.

Good quality quilting fabric costs anywhere between $24 - $28 a metre (which is only a fraction longer than a yard).

We have a bargain / bulk fabric store, but the material is generally of lesser quality, and often not worth it. Every now and then there is good quality fabric at a bargain price, but they're few and far between.

I have bought online, and off ebay, but once the exchange rate and postage is added in, it's only slightly cheaper.

Lisa T

I have heard that in other countries fabric is prohibitively expensive. I live fairly close to the Canadian border- and was surprised recently to hear that quilters cross the border to buy fabric in the States because it's half the price here.

Wow! And I thought $9 a yard was bad.

BlueChicken

lol

We'd explode with excitment at $9!

It can be a very expensive hobby here. There are always ways to keep costs low if you have to, but if you want really good quality, you've got to pay for it.

Lisa T

I guess I'd be cutting up shirts and stuff at that point. A whole quilt would cost a couple hundred bucks! Is batting/wadding more also?

BlueChicken

Yep... for a large quilt you're looking at several hundred dollars worth of fabric. And the more complex the design obviously the more fabric required.

Backing is slightly cheaper, although I use a lot of polar fleece and faux fur throws as backing because the kids love the feel of it.

I've never really paid much attention to the price, just bought what I wanted (gotta love that credit card! lol) but things are getting tight over here too, so I'm starting to pay more attention to what I buy.

Luckily I have a rather lovely big stash so the weeks where money is tight, I can still sew.

Lisa T

I thought I had a pretty big stash too, but then I started seeing these ROOMS on Flickr and blogs, and I realized I got nothin'! LOL! There are some stashes out there that make me just green. I can't complain though. I could make 20 quilts with my stash I bet.

(But I don't think I will ever have "enough" fabric.)

Lisa T

You know, this gets me wondering how much it really costs to make a quilt. I am going to have to start keeping track better. I do buy some fabric at thrift stores, but also do buy some of the nicer stuff. The last one that I went to Joann's and just flat out bought everything I needed, my total was about $120. I did have some fabric left over, but not all that much.

I have a lot of people ask for quilts as gifts. It's getting to the point where I think I will start buying the cheap ones at Walmart and saying I made them. LOL!

BlueChicken

LOL

Yeah... I've seen some rooms posted on here and nearly died. Maybe one day! :-)

I read somewhere once of a group of older women sitting around at a quilt class one day, chatting as you do, and several were saying how they had to stop spending so much on their stashes. The oldest piped up and said something along the lines of she wish she'd never slowed down on buying fabrics. That since she'd been retired money had been tight and she was unable to buy as she used to. She wished she had built a bigger stash as her "retirement fund", and that these women shouldn't be thinking of their stash as a guilty secret, that it was an investment in their retirement.

I susbcribe to that theory, and at this rate, I'll need to live till I'm 112. ;-)

Quilter101

I have issues with the 9 $ a yard fabric, I can't spend that much on fabric :roll: I don't make hardly anything from my parents, so I go to thrift stores.....

pocoellie

Quilter101-there's not a thing wrong with getting your fabric from thrift stores, I have been known to do that, not because I couldn't afford the fabric but because I love the dress/skirt/whatever fabric and bought to take it apart.