My husband is making me a new design board. But I'm not sure if I should cover it felt, flannel or batting. I've used flannel before and it seemed ok, but I would have to either seam it or special order extra wide flannel.

I can get 72" felt locally cheap and that size works for me. I dont' know if it holds well.

And then I've read others have used batting.

What's best?

My husband made mine - I did seam the flannel but it is not bulky because I pressed the seam open. I love how the fabric sticks to the flannel. Not sure it would do it that well with felt, but have never tried that so couldn't say for sure. Let us know what you end up using

I'll be interested to hear the answers, as I am going to have sheets of the 4'x 8' foam insulation covered.

I was on the Quilt In A Day website, and they had a project pattern which called for headliner (the fabric on the inside roof of your car) from an auto upholstery shop.

I used the felt because of the width. It works but not as well as the flannel. If I were to do it again, I would use flannel.

I watched Eleanor Burns video she did hers with Headliner fabric. I had a thin layer of foam so you could stick pins in it. I did mine in felt because it was given to me.

you can get 108" wide white flannel from fabric.com quite inexpensively. but no reason to think the felt wouldn't work, when i was a little kid in sunday school they used felt covered story boards all the time; i think we had some at times in school too. felt holds just as well as flannel, or batting. i would use what ever is most economical. can you get the felt in white?
i used the flannel and it does work great, but when i have blocks that are (heavy) lots of pieces, sometimes i do have to stick a pin in...but it's not a problem

Does the fabric stick really well without pinning?

has anyone purchased a design wall? which one and where?

I use a flannel sheet that I purchased at Walmart. It's double bed size and I have it on a curtain rod. I can take it down and wash it any time. Blocks stay on it really well-I'm doing the Farmers Wife Sampler and right now it has 46 blocks on it.

My husband made mine, using the 3/4 inch insulation and after spraying it with a spray adhesive, covered it in Warm & Natural batting. I love it. The batting keeps a queen size quilt top on the design wall without needing pins to hold it there. Since it's 90 inches wide, there was no need to seam it at all. Just a thought.