Stitch in the Ditch

I am a hand quilter mostly but have had a few quilted on the laq and love how it is heavier than hand quilted. But I have always taken great pride in my handiwork and will continue to do so. What is happening now is that I have so many quilt tops I will take forever to hand quilt so Am going to let a friend who is needing some income because her DH is not well or working. I always look at the quilt first and then the stitching so not distracted by the amount of quilting. I enjoyed reading this post.

Come back here!! LOL

I agree with the batting making more difference in the stiffness of the quilt than the quilting does to a point. I'm betting the people complaining about too much quilting making the quilt stiff are using Warm and Natural. That batting gets stiff as a board if you quilt it very close.

Then there's micro quilting. There's a gorgeous wall quilt being shown in quilt shows in this area that has trees and a stream with a bridge over it. It is intensly quilted and quite stiff. But that's the way the maker intended for it to turn out.

I saw a Vintage Valentine quilt in the quilt show that the quilting pretty much ruined the quilt. Vintage Valentine is a gorgeous, album style applique quilt and the maker did an all over, smallish meander.

Duh.......thanks

I'll second (3rd, 4th) the statement that the batting is what makes for a very stiff quilt when heavily quilted. I free motion my own quilts, and I tend to do pretty heavy coverage (it's what I like) but I do not have stiff quilts -- they get crinkly-- again what I like. But they have a very nice drape.

I'll use all kinds of different batts -- what ever is on sale. But I always do a trial before I take on the whole quilt, so I have a sense of how it will feel, shrinkage and crinkling after washing and drying, etc.

Something I see often on quilt blogs, usually with enthusiastic beginners, is heavy quilting in one area, and completely unquilted in other areas -- to my eye it's not a very pleasing effect, specially after some real world use. I also cringe at very wide borders left completely unquilted. I've been guilty of that one when I was hand quitlting and just ready to be done with a project. But the real purpose of a wide border (other than to meet the bed size requirement) is to showcase some mad quilting skilz, not to just hang there looking limp and neglected.

Here's my two cents worth... Please allow the beauty of your pieced quilts to shine through; do not let them be quilted to death, however you choose to quilt them.

This may sound whiny, and I have nothing against long arm quilters (personally or that the option exists), so I apologize if this strikes someone the wrong way.

I went to a local show, and probably 80% of the quilts there were quilted by one particular longarmer (I know, because they credited her). The work was beautiful, don't get me wrong. But I felt like it gave an unfair advantage to some of the quilts that were actually quite plain otherwise. It seems like the person with either enough money to own a longarm or enough money to hire out all their quilting has an advantage at shows over the person who quilts their own on their machine (which I do, but I'm just not good enough yet to compete with professionals) or handquilts (because so few have the time to quilt as densely as a longarmer can. And it seems like who has the "best quilt" as determined by placing in the show shouldn't depend on who has more money.

I guess I feel like the fair thing to do would be to have separate categories for quilts that are hand quilted, home machine quilted, and hired out. Maybe some shows do that. I've really only been to the one.

Most shows do separate those things out. In the big machine quilting shows, they even split out between the hand guided systems from the computer guided systems.

The goal is to have the quilting match the quilt, to have it complement the top. Too much quilting is just as bad as a beautifully pieced, intricate top that has been tied with yarn. (You don't want to get me started!!)

I think the densely quilted quilts are mostly for show or to hang. I've seen some stunning examples of this and think they are mainly for entering a show.
I've done heavy quilting on a few, but do not use those as bedding.
When I do bedding, I pretty much put the same amount of quilting on as I would if I were still able to hand quilt the quilts.

I am a mid arm quilter (Part time) and I have the same feeling. I have been to shows and I think the "too much" quilting is beautiful. It is in another class, art quilts. For me, I like to look at them, but as far as me doing them, or wanting them, I'll do the ones that want to let the fabric and the design shine through. The excess quilting makes the quilt very stiff usually and not one that you are going to want to use. They are the ones that will be hung on the wall and admired from there. That type of quilting isn't meant for every quilt. I do admire the LAQ who can do that kind of work and do it so beautifully.