I have only completed one quilt so I'm not an expert at this. But my dad's girlfriend made me a quilt that was tied down. I've had it for two years and some of the ties have come out (and one of the ties created this little tear) from regular usage and washings. It still holds together pretty well, but sooner or later something has to be done about it. Based on that, I would suggest quilting it rather than tying it so the regular usage doesn't tear the fabric and so you don't have to replace ties every so often.