Quilt in a Day Forums

I am helping a young lady that is new to quilting make a quilt that is strip pieced. Yesterday she asked why some of her strips were so much shorter than the others when sewn together. I told her, "let's measure them"....would you believe some of that quilt shop fabric was only 40" wide and some 42" wide....I may have been quilting for a long time and haven't noticed the change, but I thought most fabric was manufactured at 44" or 45"...sounds like the grocery store packaging is coming to the fabric lines??? Let me know your experience.

That happened to me when I made my son's split rail fence quilt. I didn't buy enough fabric. I was supposed to get five squares across, but only got four WOF. Went back to the store and they were out of some of the fabrics that I had chosen. So, I put a wide border on it. :^(

And I remember that some of the fabrics were Windham and some were South Seas!

Some of the fabric is only 39" and this is not something new, when I owned the quilt shop (now retired) our fabric came in and none of it was ever wider than 43" so this is not new. Marge

I've noticed it too. Less and less is 44", but I think, way back in the dark ages all fabric was 36" wide. I may be wrong about that tho.

I have seen some of that 36" fabric in my grandmother's fabric or some other old fabric.

Kathy

sunsup - you're right! And if I remember right, that is how you can tell the age of some fabric. Seems like 36" was in the 30's. I haven't really checked! And I haven't noticed, probably because I use the fabric lengthwise for borders (they hold their shape better and don't stretch at all).

Joanne:0)

I started sewing with 36 inch fabric when I was in high school, ooppss, showing my age. That was in the late 50's. As I recall that was just about the time 44-45 inch started appearing and I really think it has shrunk from then on!!!! LOL
I've been seeing charts now begin to show fabric widths as 40-42 inch, or at least suggest that "you may not get as many blocks as in the chart if your fabric is less than 44 inches.
Yep, the grocery and everything else sizing has come to fabric.
Has anyone noticed the "tiny" size of TP?
carol/kittyquilt

I bought a table runner quilt kit a couple of months ago from my LQS and put it together recently. I had to sew several WOF strips together and was noticing that some strips were much shorter. I wondered why that was. Fortunately, I had enough fabric so didn't think about it again until right now.

When I buy fabric I figure the width at 40", even if the bolt says it's 44". I've found that many fabrics don't even measure up to what they're supposed to, let alone be straight. Most are so darn crooked anymore you need a 1/8 yard extra just to square it up. Quality went out the window long ago.

I've noticed that besides being shorter in the first place, the salvage on one side is often an inch or better! Making the width that much shorter!
Kitty- I too remember the 36" fabric from the late 1960's! LOL
JC Penny and Sears used to carry it!

Sue