How to Make Quilts from Fabric Panels

Great Tips for Handling Common Issues That May Crop Up!

So many wonderful printed fabric panels are available these days that it’s hard to choose just one. Often these panels are designed for incorporating into quilts (Fat Quarter Shop has a great selection).

Sometimes a panel is one big image, perfect for the center of a quilt. Just add borders, layer, quilt, and bind.

Other times a panel is meant for cutting into smaller squares or rectangles to showcase among the pieced blocks in a quilt.

Sometimes a panel will come with both – a big center image and smaller ones to piece with other fabrics to round out the quilt.

Besides the obvious appeal of having a large printed image to work with, we’ll often choose a fabric panel as a quick way to create a quilt. This is especially true for wall and baby quilts.

But how easy are panels to work with, really?

Panels do present some challenges. One issue is that sometimes they’re not printed squarely on the fabric – or, more commonly, the panel is skewed from being wound incorrectly on the bolt. If you’ve ever encountered either of these you know how challenging they can be.

Fortunately, Laura from Sew Very Easy has a great solution for that and other issues that may crop up. Watch the following video for her helpful tips for working with panels.

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