Washing completed quilt top before quilting?
 

I am making my first quilt with a layer cake pack. I did not pre-wash the squares, but when I am finished sewing the quilt top, should I wash it then? I plan to use a minky fabric on the back, so I am not sure if the materials will shrink differently once the quilt is completed and washed. Any advice or tips are welcome because I am a very green sewer and quilter! Thank you!

you need to wait until your quilt is quilted & bound before washing- otherwise you will have quite a mess to deal with. don't worry about it---unless you have deep, saturated colors that may run- if that is the case then when the quilt is completed toss in color catchers- or use synthropol (an agent that will keep running colors suspended in the water-not on other fabrics) as for the shrinkage---the quilting and batting will play a roll too- I've backed many quilts with minkie- sometimes I pre-wash , sometimes I don't, often my quilts contain both pre-washed and new (unwashed) fabrics- I've never had a problem because of that. since the minkie is polyester you will want to wash your FINISHED quilt in cool water- I toss mine into a regular dryer cycle- they turn out just fine. my concerns with prewashing are usually based on- is the fabric a loose weave- needs to be tightened up? is it a thin flannel? will it bleed? (I test to see) does it feel funky? does it smell funky? does it have marks, soil, stains on it-sometimes from spending a long time on the bolt in a shop?

I agree completely with ckcowl. Never ever wash just a quilt top. It will be impossible to get it pressed again, the seams will all fray (and the threads will tangle up), and some of the seams may come undone as a result.

I'm with the others, don't wash a quilt top.

Welcome to this wonderful board.

I also would never wash a top, for the reasons mentioned above. I've seen what happens (I work in a LQS) Yikes!

Many years ago, when I could still crawl on the floor, I basted a quilt on the floor, left it overnight, and found the next morning that my cat had urinated right smack-dab in the middle of it! I sprinkled it with baking soda and let it dry, then brushed it off. It still smelled somewhat, but not as bad, and I proceeded to quilt it. When it was done, I washed it, and the smell and stain disappeared.

I have done it - with a queen size jelly roll quilt. I folded it in fourths and safety pinned it around the edges. Then I washed it on the gentle cycle with cold water and a little laundry detergent. It came out ok.

Unpinned it and put it in the dryer to dry.

Luckily, I had no problems with it, but now I wonder exactly what I was thinking! It was early in my quilting experience, so I can only explain it as ignorance! I don't recommend it to anyone!

I would "NEVER" wash a quilt before you have done the quilting!!! You might end up with a lot of pieces!!!

I have a quilt top that someone washed, that I'll never get it flat enough to quilt, but I'm gonna try it. It isn't a quilt if I don't finish it.

Don't wash until it is finished. What dunster and ckcowl said is true. Ask me how I know. :(

CK is a pretty smart cookie. You can't go wrong listening to her advice. The only way I would wash a completed quilt top is to put it into a king size pillow case and put a knot in the end of the case. Then only on gentle.

No washing before quilting. Unless you prewash the fabrics before they are cut. After that, it's a bit late. Just use a Color Catcher after the quilting/binding are done.

I've never washed a quilt top and wouldn't take a chance on doing it. If I felt I really had to wash it I would try just soaking it in warm water,towel dryng and laying to dry. I've never tried this either but I think it would be more gentle then washing. You'd probably have to do a lot of pressing.

I took a top to my grandaughter's baby shower. I needed to quilt it so took it back but spilled juice from the pan the ham was cooked in all over the top. Duh...was really upset. Had to wash it...what a mess! I had to repair many little seams and it was a buggar to iron. So...no...don't wash until quilted!!

I was given 4 quilt tops that were from goodwill, they smelled bad, I soaked them in cold soap water and spun on gentle, then dried, there were some strings but in all not to bad. I would never have quilted them if I could not have
wash them. the ones I make ,I wait until they are quilted before washing.

I would not wash it until it is finished and then throw in some colorcatchers. I made a quilt top with batik layer cakes and sashed it with plain black fabric. I became afraid it would bleed on the cherry backing so I washed it and the batik and cotton fabric did not lay straight afterwards. They must have shrunk some. I had to really iron it smooth again but I learned a good lesson from this.

I did it once to try to save some tops my DGM made. Long story short - sewer line backed up into basement where tops were stored. Fortunately Grandma used wide seams because they did fray badly. I spent hours cutting balls of knots and loose threads and more hours trying to iron them flat. I will never again wash a top before it is quilted.

And most experienced quilters said, "Amen!"

I prewash all my fabric before I do anything else. You never know. But, I do not wash again before finishing.

Well... Tonight I just learned this lesson the hard way and I'm having to start over and build the quilt top again from scratch. I might stop crying by the end of the week....lol

In my early days, I washed some 80/20 batting. What a mess, totally unusable. I learned a good lesson what not to do.

I only pre-washed one top and I did not expect the outcome and will not do it again. Always quilt first.

Yup, I've had that disaster happen too. Washed a top and all the seam allowances frayed and some frayed so much the seams were open! I managed to repair it and had to quilt it with serpentine stitch over all the seams, to hold them together. Ugh. Never again.

I would wash (actually - just flush the afflicted areas) if there was something really gross on it that had to be removed such as blood, vomit, urine, food and beverage stains

The handling grime ( in my world that includes starch/sizing and glue basting pruducts ) can wait until the item is finished to be washed out.

I am in tbe group that washes all washable components before using them in an item. This includes trims like rickrack, bias tape,, and zippers.. uneven shrinkage annoys me.

I did that exactly one time- never again! What a mess.

I realize this is a really old thread, but I'll post my experience here anyway in hopes it might help someone else in the future.

I washed an unquilted top once because I discovered one of the fabrics was going to bleed, but I did it very carefully and was successful. Here's how I did it:
I filled my top-loading washer with hot water, added a tablespoon of Dawn, put the top in. After the machine was done filling but before it could start agitating, I pulled the plug and let it sit overnight (12 hours). The next day I plugged the machine back in, hit the cancel button, then set it on a rinse-and-spin cycle. The quilt top was never agitated. It drained and spun "dry" (damp). I laid it out on my living room floor to air dry. The bleed was permanently fixed, the back of the top had no stringy nests or mess, I was a happy quilter!
p.s. LOVE my Speed Queen.

In January, I quilted three tops for my SIL, whose grandmother had made them. Someone down through the years decided they needed washing and ohmigosh, what a disaster. I had balls of frayed thread, split seams to repair and fabric so fragile that they would probably never withstand another laundering.

None of them were square or anything close to it - but I started the one that was the best made about eight years ago and then gave up until this year.

At New Year's, I dragged them out and finished repairing the damage that I could. I used pre-shrunk flannel for "batting" so that if my SIL ever decided to wash them, the flannel could help support the fragile tops.

I quilted the heck out of all of them, got them bound and then took them to her, with notes about where to find instructions for washing antique quilts, especially the most fragile one. I couldn't accept the responsibility of washing them, myself.

The quilting and binding had improved them a lot and I was happy knowing that I had done everything I could do.

I won't ever do it again, though! 😄

Good idea. I would have to do the soaking in the bathtub and then just do a rinse/spin cycle with this new washer of mine, but at least I could do it. I'm glad you kept it from bleeding!

I did that once - washed the top before quilting. Popped a bunch of seams. Never again!