Watson

I am planning to double bat my next quilt. It is done in black/teal/purple with a dark print on the back. I have enough black batting to do one layer...if I do the top layer in a natural batting, will I get little bits of batting poking through the top? Or do pokeys only happen on the back? Do I need to buy more black batting to do both layers with?

Thanks,
Watson

Jeanne S

I have never had an issue with bearding (batting fibers coming through the needle holes) and have made lots of quilts with black backgrounds. Maybe you could do a test block with two layers of batting and dark fabrics and see if you might have the problem before buying more black batting.

Jingle

I have used black batting with lighter colors too. I doubt the black will be a problem. Try it and see. Seems others have had problems with different results than I get.

quiltingshorttimer

I think bearding depends so much on several factors--the tightness of the fabric weave, the density of the quilting (lots of overlapping) the weight of the thread (lower # =bigger needle). I will usually go ahead and use 2 black bats if I have black background on top and bottom--I figure bat isn't perishable and I can save the neutral or white for something else and just not worry about it that way.

P.S. if you are using 2 bats to get lots of quilting definition, I found great success with one bat being Hobbs 80/20 black bat and one on top of it being the Quilter's Dream black poly from Connecting Threads--not always in their mailed catalog so check their website or give them a call.