How to Apply Quilt Borders & Basting

Barbara Black: Hi, my name is Barbara Black, I am a professional quilt maker and teacher. Today I am showing you how to make a quilt. Now let's talk about borders and basting The most important thing to do, when you add border to a quilt, whether it's a small wall hanging like this side or a queen size quilt for a bed, is that you measure the quilt, the inside of the quilt before you add the borders. These quilt blocks that you have made should measure nine and half inches when you have got it assembled, that includes -- that's a nine inch finished block and a quarter inch seam allowance on all four sides. The first two pieces of border that I have cut are cut nine and a half inches long and I have set this border to be cut two and a half inches. That's a good size for this small wall hanging and that's the size we are going to use for the entire border.

So I have two strips of border that are cut nine and a half inches by two and a half inches. That's for the left and right sides. I then have top border and a bottom border also cut two and a half inches wide. But they need to be cut thirteen and a half inches. The block is nine inches, we will have a two inch finished border on this side and a two inch finished border on this side, that adds up to 13 inches and then you need that quarter inch seam allowance on both the left and right sides. First I have joined the left and the right sides with a straight stitch and I have then pressed those toward the outside, toward the border. I have added the top border, pressed it toward the outside and lastly I will add this final border piece by turning them right sides together, I would pin on the two outside edges at least one pin in the middle and a couple of more pins just to hold it right along and then you will sew your quarter of an inch seam allowance and the final seam that is pressed towards the outside border. Now you have your wall hanging done and you are ready to put it together with the back and the batting. I have a white fabric for the back. This is a small wall handing and it was just a little piece of white fabric to make a nice simple back. The thing to be aware of when you are choosing back fabrics is whether you want to stitching to show or not. A choice of a very light fabric like this, will make every single stitch show, whether you hand stitch or you machine stitch. I have got the light fabric and then I have chosen a small piece of cotton batting, the cotton batting today is very easy to work with and provides a really nice finished quilt. Whether it's a bed side quilt or a small wall hanging like this. The back and batting have to be larger than the quilt top itself. I have got at least two inches of batting on either side of the quilt top. If you are making a bed side quilt, you need to base the three layers together. For the quilt this small a few pins placed on top on the block to hold the units together are all you will need for basting, but when you are working on a big quilt the pins would fall out and that wouldn't work. So some people baste with safety pins, some people baste with thread going through the three layers with a big long stitch and some people even use safety pins for machine quilting. So that is how you add your borders and baste the three layers together. Now let's talk about the quilting and finishing the quilt.