I'm glad you found the solution that I recommend to quilters. I, too, have had this happen to me....on a show quilt! After I did the hot water/dawn procedure, no more bleeding. The quilt has gone on to win 2 2nd place ribbons, & is slated for another show in March.

I had that happened to me on a quilt I made my mother. DIdn't notice that the red had bled on the white before throwing it into the dryer so was shocked and upset. Someone on this site said to throw it back into the washer with a color catcher. I did and the bleeding came out............even after it had been dried no less so I was floored and very happy to say the least. I swear by the color catchers these days. I only wash with cold water though.

I'd heard about using the blue Dawn but haven't had to use it (thankfully) so glad to hear that it does work.

Did you prewash the red fabric before piecing? I am starting a red and white in January and just curious if prewashing helps.

I would suggest prewashing for any red fabric. Use the hot water/dawn treatment for it. After the 1st treatment, it still bleeds, do it again. By the way, blue is actually worse than red for bleeding. So prewash them as well.

The first sentence in my post: "I always prewash all of my fabrics with color catchers and have never had a bleeder... until now!"

Thank you so much for sharing your solution. I recently completed 13 complex star blocks and only realized that the purple fat quarter I had used was a bleeder. I had not assembled the quilt. I think I will get them out and try your solution. Maybe--just maybe--all that work will be useful after all.

Thanks for sharing! That's a good thing to know just in case. Even when one is totally doing all one can to have things run amok, sometimes they do. Glad you were able to "save" your quilt.

So glad this was able to help you, I have heard of this before, dawn seems to be the cure all, I love it, and thank you for the reminder

Oh man we have all been there! What a great tip. Thanks for sharing.