Different Quilting Techniques & Methods

Old Style Hand Tying

Hand tying involves taking a stitch through all layers of the quilt using a large needle (embroidery needle), then tying  a knot or bow on top of the quilt. Knots are approx. 4 to 5 inches apart. This is the oldest and fastest method of finishing a quilt top. The American Indians taught us this method.

Sewing machine quilting involves straight-line stitching throughout the quilt, although the stitching sometimes follows the outlines of designs.

This can be done by most sewing machines, however, a quilters sewing machine allows a lot more room to do this for larger quilts. This takes practice to do machine stitching. If you can, put your machine at a slower pace, perhaps put on soft music to slow you down.  You will want to be comfortable, and keep your machine at a consistent speed with even stitches.

If you do not feel like hand quilting, or machine quilting a quilt yourself there are some people who own very large quilting machines.  These machines do some pretty fancy quilting as you can see in the photo to the right. 

One of the drawbacks of quilting this way is it cost money. Another draw back is "you didn't do it yourself".  However, nether of those draw back bother me, I simply do not have the time to hand quilt all of my quilts with running the sewing school and this website, so I am always at my quilt ladies house dropping off and picking up quilts she has quilted for me.

When Hand Quilting it will almost look like a running stitch and you will be going through all 3 layers, the quilt top, the batting, and the backing. A single strand of 100% cotton quilting thread is used. Quilting thread is generally glazed to make it glide through all the layers and it is stronger than regular sewing thread.

Hand quilting takes a lot of time and patience.  Make sure you are seated comfortable and have everything right where you will need it so that you will not have any interruptions.

There are four basic type of quilt finishes, or methods.  Hand Quilting, the traditional method, is still done today in many parts of the world. The result is a beautiful quilt that took hours to make and was truly made with love by hand.  Many quilt circles today still gather and quilt by hand while simple chit-chat takes place. Old Style Hand Tying is the easiest and quickest way to quilt. Simple bed quilts that would be used over and over again were hand tied. The nicer quilts that were shown back in the 1800's were quilted by hand. Sewing machine quilting can be done today with most machines and is becoming more and more popular.

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