Narrow width fabric

Sep 08, 2005 9 Replies

Well, I am running late on Wendy's swap, per usual. I bought 2 nice fabric at Hancock's Chain Store, and assumed the standard



42-44" wide. Wendy's instructions were to cut F8 (fat eighths at
18" long by about 11" wide.) As soon as I cut the first section of fabric number two, I noticed it seemed (uh oh!) too narrow. Yep, it measured 37" wide!! I cut three pieces from the rest of that yardage. Then I had to find assorted pieces in stash to fill the requirements of 8 pieces per packet. The selvage mark is unfamiliar to me: Signature Classics by Oakhurst Textiles. So, be warned and check the width, do not assume anything! PAT in VA/USA

eeeeeeeek, they are getting like the food industry. dont charge us more for whatever, just reduce the contents of whatever it is we're buying. grrrrrrrr. this really ticks me off. i reckon the stores ought to know some bolts are narrower and advise somewhere obvious. soon it will be impossible to get the standards FQ then where will we all be????? we are not amused!!!! jeanne

Wow....fabric used to come in 36" widths..but I thought they stopped that years ago. Thanks for the warning. Mary

As soon as I cut the first section

I cut three pieces from the rest of

About 40 years ago, all the fabric I ever bought for sewing was about

36" wide. I was amazed when it got wider.

ALZ wrote:

I used some fat quarters from JoAnn's in a Turning Twenty quilt last week. The fabric had felt like OK quality so I purchased them and added them to my quilt shop fat quarters. The pattern instructions say to cut a 3.5" strip, a 6.5" strip and a 10.5" strip. That equals 20.5" out of a fat quarter which is 21" or 22" the long direction. The first set I didn't measure before cutting and the JoAnn's fat quarters were less than 20". I didn't have enough for the last cut. I thought maybe I had cut in the wrong direction. No, the pieces had measured 18" by

19.5"! From now >Well, I am running late on Wendy's swap, per usual. I bought 2

I don't think so, since a fat quarter is, by definition a half yard wide by half the width (selvedge to fold rather than selvedge to selvedge). A fat quarter of 60" wide fabric is going to be 18X30, not 18X20 or 18X21 for example.

Hmm well if she bought the ones on the "wall" that are called Quarter Flats...they don't say they are a fat quarter, they say they are 18x22. I just pulled one of mine out to look...(and unlike others I have seen, they don't say "approximately" either..I think some of the bundles say that)

Roberta (in VA)

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