frannella

Hi- I am trying to help a friend reinforce a quilt so that she can put it back on a bed without damaging it. My friend inherited the quilt from her mother who, in turn, was given the quilt by a sewing collective in gratitude for NFP bookkeeping services over many years.

This quilt was originally bound by folding under a 1/4 inch of fabric on both the front and back and then hand-stitched together. Both the top border and the backing are the same fabric--a strong (for a 60-70 year-old fabric) blue and white striped denim type fabric that is lighter than jeans weight. Some of this 'self-edging' has unraveled or frayed. I have picked out the the stitching to separate the edges and intend to refinish them with a double-layer binding from 2.5 inch strips.

The quilt is otherwise in reasonably good shape and beautifully hand quilted, including a lovely 4.5" border. Unfortunately, this hand quilting on the border extends very close (within one inch for the most part) to the current finished edges of the quilt, so I am hesitant to trim the quilt edges so as to cut off the weakened fabric at the edges. It's possible but carries the risk of sewing too close to the quilting stitches in the border and/or looking funny when done. This might get me back to stronger fabric in most areas and be the least invasive.

I have considered possibly reinforcing the the edges by applying a 1" strip of fusible interfacing on the fabric edges of the quilt top and back. Do you think that would make the newly bound edges too stiff? If this is a good idea, could anyone suggest a product to use? How about the fusible that allows you to piece batting pieces together?

Another thought is to cut 3 inch binding strips and take a deeper (.5"?) seam when sewing the binding to the front side of the quilt before wrapping it around to the back and hand stitching.


Any thoughts or suggestions? TIA