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What is a Quilt?Understand the rules that define the craft of quiltingQuilting is the act of stitching several layers of fabric and batting together. A quilt can therefore be easily defined as any project that has two layers of fabric sandwiched by a layer of batting that is all held together by quilting stitches.
Unfortunately it's a bit limiting. Since a quilt is defined in this way, many project will not count as quilts. Crazy Quilts for example are often not sandwiched with batting. Does this make a Crazy Quilt not a quilt? Also many art quilters use many more than three layers in their work. Just because a quilt is defined as three layers doesn't mean that's all it has to be. In the quilt to the right I used up to 4 layers of fabric and 2 layers of batting. It just goes to show that any definition deserves to be bent occasionally. Other aspects of quilting, are not bent so easily. Our 1/4" seam allowance for instance. Many quilts have pieced tops, meaning that fabric pieces were sewn together in blocks, and then the blocks were sewn together to create a quilt. All of these seams use a very exact 1/4" seam allowance. When you deviate from this seam allowance, even 1/16" per block, this small amount will magnify itself across the surface of your quilt. This is why it's so very important to stitch accurately and carefully when piecing any patchwork quilt. And not all quilts are pieced! Keep this in mind too. Wholecloth quilts are quilts created with extremely wide fabric that is marked and then quilted. No piecing is necessary because the design will be entirely created by the quilting stitches. With so many rules, many people might feel limited by quilting. After all, when you enter a painting into an art show, you're not being judged by the tightness of your canvas or the exact precision of your brush strokes. But this is why so many women quilt - it's a challenge! Quilting is an amazingly versatile and extremely fun hobby. Give two quilters the exact same fabric and they will come up with two totally different, but equally amazing quilts. Are you ready to start quilting? Then let's get started learning how to make your first quilt!
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Day Style Designs Online: What is a Quilt?
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This
is how a quilt is defined by any quilt show,
and by most quilters.