I agree with many statement that have already been made. I think the softness of a quilt comes down mostly to the batting you have selected. I have always preferred to quilt that has the look of hand quilting. I don't like the quilting to be saying "hey look at me" when the pieced quilt top is so pretty. The quilting should enhance and not be in competition with the pieced top who should be the star of any show.

I have tried many different battings and like the Pellon for draping. I has a real nice feel to it. Also, when I quilt, I take longer stitch length.

I do straight line quilting about 2" apart most of the time.

The closer the quilting, the stiffer the quilt. I've also found that "100% cotton" with scrim makes for stiffer quilts. Hobbs 80/20 leads to nicely draping, softer quilts even with close quilting.

The last couple quilts I made were with Warm+Natural. I do a medium density quilting. After they were washed they were super soft. The wool batting and silk batting are very light and soft, but I haven't used either one for a bed-size quilt.

I've been seeing so much super dense quilting on people's blogs like Quiltingismytherapy. I really wonder how those are for actual use. But they are intriguing...

i'm a moderate quilter. i like overall patterns sometimes, and sometimes i like element inspired motif quilting.

i am not a huge fan of super ornate or close stitching that overwhelms the piecing design. while i can appreciate the skill, the final product often leaves me cold.

i love whole cloth quilts of you really want to get funky with the stitching.

mostly i like them done :)

aileen

It depends on the purpose. If it's a quilt for show then quilt as densely as you want. If it's for use I think a less dense pattern is better. My mother and grandmother both tied all their quilts pretty much just enough to keep the batting in place. 2 of the 3 quilts I'm working on right now will be best served by simple SITD quilting for the most part. The 3rd I'm still undecided about.
I do prefer quilts where the quilting and the piecing are in harmony with each other.
It's whatever works best for you.
Rodney

In my experience, softness of the finished quilt depends largely on (1) batting used, (2) type of thread used, and (3) density of quilting, in that order.

Warm and Natural batting has a stiff drape that softens up somewhat with multiple washings. If you want the quilt to be soft to begin with, I recommend trying Hobbs 80/20 or Hobbs PolyDown. These two battings also provide more relief to the quilting lines (compared to Warm and Natural, which yields a flatter finish on the quilting).

I have quilted very closely using Glide thread, which is a trilobal polyester, and the quilt remained soft. Close quilting with cotton thread in top and bobbin (King Tut) resulted in a stiffer quilt.

If you do the same amount of quilting (3-4") using one of the Hobbs battings and Glide thread, I'm sure you would find the result considerably softer. I really like the PolyDown for softness, but find that it is a little harder for me to quilt as its loft is "springier" than the 80/20.

One advantage of PolyDown, which is a polyester batting, is that the quilts dry faster than a cotton batting. They are also lighter in weight. This makes PolyDown a great choice for children's quilts (and also for large bed quilts when you don't want a lot of weight and don't want to wait 3 days for the quilt to dry completely after washing).

Edit: A lot of the show-winning competition quilts that are densely quilted are quilted with 100wt silk thread (which is very fine). I have no idea how stiff or soft those finished quilts are, but I do know that the same amount of quilting with King Tut would result in a lot of stiffness.

I totally agreee with Rodney that the purpose of the quilt has a lot to do with how dense the quilting should be. The design of the top is a big factor, as well. The quilting has to work in partnership with the piecing/appliqué to be most effective visually.

Since i don't do FMQing...mine tends to be minimal...whatever the pattern itself says it needs. I do mostly SITD and echo quilting with my trusty regular machine and walking foot. I always buy W&N batting that allows for 10" between quilt lines so that i have maximum flexibility.