A customer bought four hand quilted lap sized quilts then asked that they be made into one quilt. I did not take off the bindings. I used strong hand quilting thread and the ladder stitch and put it together like a potholder quilt.

You also made it more beautiful!

I have done this three times. It is a real pain but it can be done and you'd never know it. The first one was a quilt I had made for my son and he got a larger bed, the other two were twin size and when I got the newer thicker mattresses they barely covered them.
What I did was take the binding off, make the addition top, batting and backing. I did each side and then the ends. I first put the backing on, then butted the batting and whipped stitched it,(I laid the new batt on top of the old and cut it so it met perfectly) and then added the top fabric.(I moved it up a half inch or so, so I wasn't sewing in the previous seam) They look fine but I swear it would have been easier to make new quilts. The twin that I made into queen size actually looked better. I had several borders on it but they were thin and the old entire quilt fit the top of a queen size bed then I added the new borders and they were wider and framed the original. I had a little problem finding fabric that looked like it belonged since it was all in dark green and cream .Every year it seems the basic colors have a tint that is just a smidge off of the previous season and this quilt was 8 years when I reworked it. He loved it and still does so it was worth it. If you just have to make it longer, it will be so much easier. Good luck.

my daughter wanted me to make her queen bigger i hd made her a few years ago. She is getting a king. My answer to her was get a plain white bedspread and use the queen quilt as a topper. I will even buy the bedspread. I knowwwww, I am lazy, but I am not ripping out a binding and rebind.Nope not me. LOL All the methods sound good though.

Are you taking the binding off? I have a lap size too that I want to enlarge but I keep thinking about how long it will take to remove the binding first in order to add extra borders to enlarge it. It is a "quilt as you go" using four inch strips of fabric (kind of like a large log cabin square). It's a very pretty floral print quilt - just wish it was larger.

Actually, after reading some of these threads, looks like you can either use your ripper to remove binding or just cut it off as someone suggested. That would be much easier.

A few years ago I made a lap quilt for a friend, using standard dimensions. However, she is quite tall and wanted to use it on her single bed as a topper. So, I removed all the binding, the top and bottom borders (including the quilting). Created piano keys borders which I attached to the top and bottom only (luckily still had the leftovers), attached more backing, inserted additional batting and the original borders and finished it off as usual. A real bonus for her was that I made new binding and atttached it much more nicely than I had originally.

WOW, Its gorgeous! I would never have guessed! Thanks.

You gals are amazing! I am so glad I asked!!!!!

After having done it several times, I do not think you are lazy but really smart, your solution will definitely be the one I recommend the next time enlarging a quilt is mentioned.

The quilt as you go (QAYG) method will work, but will look best if you have some similar lines in the original quilt. For example, if you have a small inner border or sashing, adding a QAYG "bridge" or connector strip will look ok. I did this a while back and the inner border was 2" finished. It really looked too big, compared to the QAYG "bridge" so I simply added two rows of quilting to that border, making it look like it was three smaller strips. Unless they looked closely, no one noticed that I did this. Good Luck!