Niece has asked me to make a t-shirt quilt. I've seen the methods and seen some quite stunning ones at quilt shows. Maybe I could talk me into it but am having a problem already with the time involved and the results. What is the life-expectancy of such a quilt? Do they make it through use and laundry with any sort of decent appearance - or are they used to dry the dog in a very short time? I could just send her a nice doggy towel and get back to my regularly scheduled NewBorns in Need passion. Polly
Maybe we are all thinking the same as you and therefore have not made one? :-)
I have about 30 scout t-shirts (and that is only counting the ones that are still looking good) and have thought about a quilt, because even for the longest camp, I bring maybe 5 of the t-shirts. But it seems a big bother (stretchy fabric and weird block sizes and all) if it then doesn't hold up.
Maybe this would be a time for togetherness in the t-shirt category for you and your niece? Offer to instruct her in the making of her own masterpiece instead of taking on the whole project yourself....who knows, she might find a new hobby to share with you ...... barnyowl
Polly, Never made a T Shirt quilt or used one, so don't know how they last, but the best plan I have seen for making one is to use the gridded, fusilbe material. It is made for quilts on a grid. They used the fusilbe uncut, adhered the shirts following the grid lines and then stitched a quarter inch fold to assemble. By nipping the intersection the seams were straight going both directions and could be pressed in opposite directions. Wish I could remember the woman who demonstrated, it was on one of the TV shows. They also used some of the backs for filler blocks if the supply of decorated shirts is small.
Anna Belle in Palm Bay, currently agonizing on how to put together a BOM that have 14 different impressions of a 12 inch square.
Thu, 1 Nov 2012 15:06:16 -0500, "Polly Esther" wrote:
I've never made a T-shirt quilt BUT I think there was talk on this group a long time ago about it. Also, I saw this on a TV quilting show. I believe they used iron on interfacing on the t-shirt to stabilize it before the blocks were sewn together for the top. That way it would not stretch.. It was finished as you would any quit, maybe tied. It sounds like a lot of bother! I agree that maybe you need to get the niece to help! HTH Barbara was in SC, now in FL
Years and years ago I made one for my brother in law. He's a marathon runner and my sister was getting buried under all the t-shirts he'd collected running races. She picked out a pile shirts for me to use. Like scrap piles of fabric that didn't even make a dent in the shirt pile.
I cut off the fronts of the shirts. Ironed lightweight, woven, fusible interfacing to the wrong side of the t-shirt fronts. Then I cut those into nice squares all the same size.
The squares were simply sashed with quilting cotton and then given a cotton border as well. I machine quilted the whole thing and bound it like any other quilt.
Not the most exciting of designs, but it worked well and showed off his shirts. I'm sure you'll be much more creative in your design!
I will say that I quilted over the t-shirt fabric. I've seen a lot of these quilts where they are just quilted in the ditch around the square but not across that fabric. Mostly I've been told people skip this because they don't want to "ruin" the design on the shirt fabric. I quilted right over it because I didn't want a big 9 inch square unquilted. I want quilts to be used and big quilted areas don't wear too well and batting can bunch up. Honestly, it looked fine with quilting! I did diagonal lines about 1" apart in the blocks.
He does use this quilt to keep warm while watching tv in the cold months. It washes up fine (just like t-shirts do) and it has the extra durability of the fusible on the back. I should think it would last just fine for anyone else who takes reasonable care of their possessions.
As long as it's well made and sufficiently quilted I can't imagine why it wouldn't hold up well.
I've always heard to use fusible knit interfacing, but have the stretch of the fusible ironed on - not with the stretch of the t-shirt but the other way. The fusible knit doesn't change the hand of fabric at all, but stabilizes the t-shirt. Easy-Knit comes to mind as one of the knit fusibles.
D>> Niece has asked me to make a t-shirt quilt. I've seen the methods and seen
I made a quilt using squares from cotton polo shirts, a memory quilt for a new widow. That was about 5 years ago, and she still says how much she loves it so I guess it's still being used. No idea how often she might have washed it.
IMO if the T-shirts are >Well. I declare. Nobody's made a t-shirt quilt and used it? Polly >
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