I found some white "Kona Cotton" fabric for $2 a yard today, the end of the bolt said "Robert kaufman". Is this good fabric? I'm asking because I bought it at a store that usually carries not-so-good fabric. But this fabric had a good "feel" to it.
I've collected lots of 30's repro fat quarters and wanted to make the Mini Bow Tie pattern that's on the quilter's cache website. (I luuurrve that website). Think the Kona cotton will work for the white part? What does "Kona" mean, anyway?
I was also thinking about doing something really wild and crazy, like not washing the fabric first.
Robert Kaufman is a good manufacturer. Kona is the RK brand of solids. Do not confuse with Kona Bay which is a different company and totally different fabric. (In many ways "better" fabric from Kona Bay, many Oriental prints and such but also solids. Much more "silky" than the Kona from Kaufman.) Please do wash the Kona before using. You may find that it is a little too "beefy" or heavy for small pieces and will ravel some. Depends on how big your "Mini Bow Tie" is.
Try a block or two before cutting a lot of blocks. (always a good thing to do to check not only the fabric, but the pattern and your particular cutting/stitching accuracy.)
Good price on the Kona too.
Pati, in Phx Fabric literate, and not a snob about it. I buy good quality fabric in all sorts of places...including some places that may have a reputation for "not so good" fabric. It just takes learning how to tell "good" from "not so good"
Kona cotton by Kaufmann (other manufactures may make something called Kona cotton but I wouldn't buy it) is my absolute favorite solid to buy. Like Pati said, it is slightly beefy--meaning durable, not one of those fabrics you'll hold up to the light one day and wonder if you need 3,000 miles of binding because it's too darn thin to use in a quilt! (speaking from experience....) I find it easy to work with (I machine piece and MQ) and I especially love using it for quilts that I know will not be handled with kid gloves (kid's hands, more likely!)
Congrats! Good price for a good feel. I'd wash it. Ironing afterwards gives you a really good look at the whole surface, in case it's second-quality stuff with possible slubs or threads hanging off. If you do find surface irregularities, you can mark the selvedge on both sides of the spot to make sure it doesn't end up right in the middle of a piece when you cut. Roberta in D
"Sherry" schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@g4g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
C'mon now, Sherry. Wash that fabric. From a 'not so good place' and at $2 per yard, it just could be that the bolt was not treated kindly; could have been stored for years or somehow survived a fire. You can have it washed long before you'll have all those little repro bow ties cut. If you need something wild and crazy to do, we'll make you a fun list of things to consider. Polly
My "thread rule" is to match like fiber. If the piece is made of cotton I use cotton thread, if it is silk I use silk, etc. Reduces the amount of thinking required, and that is a good thing some days. In general my thread stash for quilting is limited to black, dark neutral, mid-neutral, light neutral, and white.
@@ Um, do you feel the need to have a resident fiber artist? I quilt, sew clothes, and do just about anything involving decorativly tangling thread. I can cook too.
Oh MAN. I hate it when you don't tell me what you know I want to hear. :-) Not really. I appreciate it. So much I am going to eat a chocolate bar in your honor. :-) Good point about cutting the bow ties first. By that time, I'm sure I'll get in the mood to wash that piece of fabric. It's not that I hate the work. I just hate to spoil that lovely crisp finish.
Welcome Beans! Never tried Hawaiian (yet, but it's on the list). Can't imagine why anyone would need to switch from cotton thread though. And it comes in any color you might wish for. Roberta in D
schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...
Like Polly says, who knows where it's been and for how long. Wash it because:
1: it may be dry rotted and will FALL APART when water touches it--ask me how I know
2: it may be EXTREMELY CHEAP and the last finishing bath is what is holding it together
3: it may be the BEST and you can bring it back to life by using some spray starch or sizing (which is what I'm HOPING it is for you)
4: it'll make most of us happy to KNOW it is the best and you didn't finish your quilt only to have a goodly amount fall apart because it wasn't. Now that would make a lot of us cry.
As an aside, I bought a _bolt of fabric_ made the quilt and then washed it.....you would not believe how many SHADES of navy blue that quilt has and it was a 2 color quilt: navy blue and white. People don't believe me when I tell them it was from the same bolt.
Butterfly (need any str>> C'mon now, Sherry. Wash that fabric. From a 'not so good place' and at >> $2
Kona is a pretty good quality cotton broadcloth, 4.3 oz/sq yard, from Kauffman, so all that fits.
Take a good look at it... is it on-grain (threads at 90o to each other)? My experience with Kona is that it doesn't have much shrinkage when washed. If you really don't want to wash it all, cut off a yard and measure precisely length and width. Run some stay stitching along the cut ends and wash and dry. Examine the yard again after washing and drying, and press it. Measure again.
Personally, if there was no shrinkage and the other fabrics in your quilt are prewashed, I'd probably go ahead and use the fabric unwashed. But I tend to live a bit dangerously.
Or, I suppose you could make a few bow tie blocks up with the unwashed fabric and then wash those and see if you like the appearance.
Most of my sewing is garments, and I often buy, for instance, cotton twill on rolls 25-100 yards at a time. Instead of prewashing it all, I prewash a yard and check for shrinkage (as above) and then cut as is, adjusting my pattern for the shrinkage percentage I've calculated. (That's easier to do with big pieces, e.g. pants, than little pieces like bow ties!) However, a lot of the woven fabric I've been buying in the past 10 years or so has had 0% shrinkage.
Anyhow, not having to wash a bolt or roll of fabric, imho, is worth the fuss factor of cutting, measuring and washing a test yard before committing yourself to having to press the whole thing. .
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