by Rachelle de Bretagne

Created on: July 09, 2011

The border ideas that you choose for your quilts are important. These are the finishing touches that show professionalism and make the quilt have impact on the eye. Borders are every bit as important as the quilt itself and give a framework to the hours of work that goes into the quilt. Several designs stand out as being the most universal of designs for either patchwork or appliqued quilts. These can be used to advantage, since not only do they enhance the presentation of the quilt but they also extend its size a little.

Triangles

When you use triangles as a finish to a quilt these can be of various sizes, and will hang at the bottom and sides of the quilt to give a finishing touch. Be careful that the triangles incorporate some element from the main quilt so that the whole image looks professional. The manner in which this was used on one recent quilt to give it more impact was to use a dark color from the quilt as an edging to triangles made from various fabrics included within the quilt.

Just like the main area of the quilt the triangles created will need a backing similar to that used for the main quilt. Triangles were cut out of the colors randomly, so that the edge of the quilt had a mixture of all the colored fabrics used in the quilt itself and triangles were cut out which were six inches from the top of the tip to the bottom edge of the triangle and ten inches at their widest point. As these were to be overlapped, more were needed than the actual diameter of the quilt and the best way to decide how many are needed is to lay the quilt out on a flat surface and place the triangles around the edge of the quilt with the required overlay. There are no triangles for the top of the quilt, since these would prove awkward in the case of a quilt being used for a bed.

To work around these triangles to give visual impact a darker color is used. In the quite made a very small print navy blue was used. This is cut into strips of one and a half inches in width. You will need rather a lot of fabric. All strips are ironed with a hem on each side and then neatly stitched to the edges of the triangles using the machine to ensure that the hems of the strips are neatly sewn down. In this case, this is top stitching, and will show on the outside of the quilt, so it's important that the thread is exactly the same color as the darker color chosen.

The backing material is stitched to each triangle with the fabric being face to face. All triangles are then turned the right

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>