I live in Central Arkansas and it's not uncommon to have ice storms and days of 30 degree weather. Not much snow but it gets cold. For warmer quilts, I use two layers of Hobbs wool batting.

Have not heard of this idea, sounds fishy to me. I think the quilt will be warm or cool depending on the batting that you use, and fabric not how much it is quilted.

Never heard that before. I use high loft poly batting, warmth without the weight. With forced air heating they are plenty warm. We even use them in the summer, when we get chilly at night.

If every other variable of the quilt is equal, the physics to this statement does seem to work. A less densely quilted quilt is going to retain more warmth than one that is heavily quilted. This may be tenths of a degree difference, or may be significantly different, I don't know. Probably not worth caring about- quilt what you like.

But it is going to be very rare that you find every other part of the quilt equal. Choose your batting based on whether you want a very warm or less warm quilt. Silk, cotton, poly, wool- they all have different characteristics.

It is the batting that determines this, not the amount of quilting. Peggi, you surprise me by perpetuating this myth, you are so knowledgable in so many aspects of quilting. You could quilt every square inch of a quilt with wool, polyester or silk batting and it will still have lovely drape and not be stiff.


To the op comment, while I have never heard this, it does seem to have a certain amount of scientific logic to it. It is the air pockets in the batting (or filling) that form the insulation which in turn, traps in body heat and traps out cold which makes the covering warmer. This is the reason why a feather down comforter or down jacket is so toasty warm, it has loads and loads of air pockets and they are minimally quilted or baffled. So it stands to reason that a lofty batting, such as wool or polyester combined with minimal quilting will indeed result in a much warmer quilt.

But as Peggi also pointed out, the batting has a lot to do with it as well. I know of many southern quilts that have just a piece of flannel as batting, others done in cotton (low loft, breathes, less air pockets) But the cotton could also stem from the historical significance of the south being cotton growing country so it was the most economical batting as well.

I'd take poly out of this statement. I haven't used wool or silk, but my Winter Wonderland quilt is heavily quilted and it comes close to being able to stand on its own. It is extremely stiff. This style of quilting would not be appropriate on a bed quilt.

I've found the really fluffy batting with minimal quilting works very well for both summer air conditioning and winter cold in my part of Texas. If I need more warmth for really cold (below freezing) then I may add a fleece throw under the quilt and may use flannel sheets, depending on whether or not we've left the heating on overnight.

Quilted or threadpainted? Judging by your posts you are an art quilter. I do know art quilters tend to do a lot of threadpainting. In my mind the difference between the two is threadpainting is more closely related to freehand machine embroidery where you go back and forth over the same spot with layers of thread, building up color and texure. Quilting still leaves some space between each line of stitching.

I have done some very heavy quilting on poly and it just simply flattens out but is still quite flexible depending on how much seaming and piecing are in the top. (this, of course, excludes fusible applique which builds up layers of fabric with an adhesive, which also tends to be stiff, even with products like Mistifuse)

Threadpainting is another whole category. It much more resembles embroidery and it will make a piece of fabric stiff even if no batting exists.

Edited to add, OK I just went and looked at some of your pictures, definitely quilting not threadpainting. So now I want to ask which type of poly did you use. Quilters Dream Poly tends to quilt up like cotton. Hobbs polydown tends to just flatten out like I described. So I guess I should amend my statement to say Hobbs Polydown poly. As QD poly is unlike any other poly out there. It is more like a cotton blend batting and I could definitely see that one stiffening up like cotton with heavy quilting.

I don't know- it wasn't Hobbs. Just something I bought at Walmart. I've always wanted to try wool and silk, but I'm cheap.

I didn't realize it was a myth, my statement is based solely on my experience. And when I say "densely quilted", I mean quilts that are quilted for shows, with stitching every eighth inch or closer. Micro-quilting, I guess you could say. I do agree that certain batts are better than others for softness, I've stopped using W&N because I find it's stiffer. Because of the scrim, maybe?