Cutting Strips Lengthwise
 

I just watched a Judy Martin video on YouTube where she says she cuts all of her strips on the lengthwise grain. According to her, it makes everything more stable and your blocks will come out better. I have never heard of doing it this way. Do any of you do it that way? Do you see a difference if you do?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ULIM...eature=related

It's true that the lengthwise grain is more stable than the crosswise grain. However, I achieve sufficient accuracy without having to cut that way.

I think that's a good idea for borders and sashing strips, as already mentioned, especially if the quilt will be hanging, because there is less stretch in the fabric in that direction. But within the body of the quilt, as I see it, it makes no difference, since any blocks you cut will have 2 sides which are on each grain, lengthwise and crosswise, no matter which way the original strip was cut.

I cut across the crosswise grain for sashing because it is simpler for me to figure out how long binding/sashing pieces that i can get out of a certain length of fabric. Everything in my stash would be consistent.

i cut my borders and sashing on the lengthwise grain only so they don't have to be pieced. i don't hang my large quilts, so stretching is not an issue. however, once the lenghtwise backing is on the quilt and the quilt is quilted, the quilt, IMHO, is pretty stable anyway. as for smaller pieces, i work slowly for accuracy, so don't feel any need to change my widthwise stripping/cutting.

I cut my borders and binding on the lengthwise. Some of my patterns specifically give that direction. It makes sense since there's less piecing that needs to be done on long pieces.

I usually plan for lengthwise cuts for strip piecing, sashings and borders, figuring anything I can do to reduce the possibility of any distortion is helpful. Only exception would be when the fabric design would look better with a cross grain cut.

Yes I try and cut long strips lengthwise except for bindings which need a bit of give. These i cut WOF.

Marti Michell does it that way too and she is one of the pioneers of quilting. I have done it and I see no difference when I piece my blocks. However I do cut lengthwise if I want long strips of fabric or if I want my borders to be just one piece.