irishrose

I want to make a simple quilt with the Warm Wishes pattern by cutting apart a panel printed with repeating flowers. Each rose has a floral border which is not printed squarely. Do I ignore it and proceed (I suspect it will drive me crazy) or do I put black strips on each picture (the background is black) and the recut to the size I want? The picture still won't be perfectly straight, but at least the block will be square.

dunster

Hard to answer without seeing the fabric. It sounds like you might be better off using this fabric for another purpose.

petthefabric

I agree, hard to answer without seeing the fabric.
I've added fabrics of the same color as the background, it's really hard to match the color close enough so it doesn't look chensy.
Another thought is to use the challange opportunity to get creative. Maybe add some borders to get the block up to the correct size. Sounds like you like things lined up very orderly. I'm usually the person in the line who is out of order. I'm comfortable with things being crocked and making it a design statement.

QuiltnNan

you could add wonky frames around each flower picture... then they look like they are supposed to be that way. and if the frame is wonky, then the flower may look a little more square?

PaperPrincess

I got some Christmas panels on sale. Florals, black background with a gorgeous printed metallic filagree frame. Cut the panels out along the frame. Messed with it for a day and could not get them squared. I'm like you in that it would have driven me crazy to have them off square, so I cut the border off (which sort of defeated the purpose) and just put black sashing on it. I was so ticked, I just gave it away when I was done. I still have the wonky filagree strips around here somewhere...

Tartan

I usually end up cutting the pre-printed borders off because they are most often wonky. It is either cutting them off or adding wonky borders to set the blocks at angles as others have mentioned. Adding a wonky frame that matches the stripes surrounding it may give a neat secondary design.

Jackie Spencer

A friend of mine bought a Christmas Panel that was wonky. She took the Bottom left hand corner in her left hand and the Top right hand corner in her right hand and stretched it, then did the same with the other 2 corners, then steam pressed it, and it worked. I had never seen anyone do that before, but it worked!!

Caroline S

I just finished a quilt with wonky panel motifs. The fabric line is Laurel Burch Fabulous Felines. I love the fabric but was so disappointed with the cat panel (it was an online order). My "fix" was just to go with the wonkyness (new word) and do a wonky log cabin improvised design.

katier825

I've had some pretty wonky border fabrics that did much better after blocking them. You might give that a try. Some were so bad I had to cut with scissors (OMG) rather than a rotary cutter. LOL

nhweaver

on My wonky log cabin, which was a UFO because of not being square, I cut put a thicker border around each wonky block, and squared up the border, it looks great. And now I am sewing the quads together. I think if you put a contrasting border around the panel, and square it up, the wonky panel seems to appear not wonky. (does this make sense??)