World Wide Quilting Page

Question of the Week

Question for the week of February 11, 2002:

Our question this week comes from Susan R

What is the calculation for determining fabric yardage for the quilt backing and bindings?

Anne :
For binding I measure the perimeter of the quilt and add 15 inches for mitered corners depends on how big the quilt is see how many strips you will need for that amount of inches and figure out the yardage you will need

anne :
I just measure the length and add 10 inches and double it

caroline :
For bindings: for double fold bias:

Fons and Porter have a formula for determing how big a square of fabric you will require, and how to cut this square into a continuous bias strip

dee :
1 1/2times size of quilt

Kathy in Washington :
Of course, it depends on the size of the quilt. For the backing you would need enough to be about four inches larger than the quilt. Unless you buy extra wide fabric, it will usually have to be pieced. There is a great little book called "The Quilter's Pocket Reference" by Peggy Scholley and published by Dover which includes, among other things, layouts and claculations for backings for various sizes of quilts.
As to the binding, that is easier to calculate. Take the measurement of the quilt along each side--two times the length and two times the width--and add them together to get the total distance around the quilt. Say your quilt is 80 by 90 inches. This would be 340. Divide this by the width of fabric--say 40 for good measure. this gives you eight plus. You will need nine strips across the width of the fabric (always round up.) Decide how wide your strips will be--I like 3 inches doubled over. So I then multiply 3 times the nine strips for 27 inches--or 3/4 yard.
I hope that makes sense.

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