Mitered Quilt Borders

Donna Young @ 22 June 2008
Filed in Categories: Hobby Quilt

http://donnayoung.org

There are several ways to miter quilt borders. Getting the miter right is important. A miter that is off will result in either a tight corner that cups or a corner that is wavy. For this big wall quilt, I will need to be picky about the corners. I’m using an angle to help me get them as square as possible with the 45 degree fold.

I’ve pinned the quilt to the ironing board making sure that it has straight edges. Then I pinned the angle to the quilt at the corner. The miter isn’t sewn or pressed yet. I’ll probably sew it by hand.

miter

Whatever works well and simplifies this process is good (for me). This is not as tedious as it looks.

- – - – - – - UPDATE – - – - – - –

This image shows the corner after it was sewn.

corner

After being satisfied with the 45 degree folds, I removed the square and flipped the other side to it’s 45 degree position. I steam pressed it, hand-sewed it, then machine sewed it. It turned out well enough even though I had to remove some errant sewing machine stitches and resew.

The only thing that is really easy about mitering corners is doing it wrong. Last night I finished two of these mitered corners and I am not happy with the second one. It needs to be taken up a bit in the middle.The tiniest bit off shows.

This is the other corner, the one I’m not happy with. After posting this image, I’ll fix the border corner. It’s hard to see, but there is fullness in the corner that should not be there.

corner

I didn’t mention this before, but the border fabric that I am using has a repeated pattern. I am centering the design of each piece on each side so that the pattern match will be decent at the corners.

Here`s to you for doing such a great job lining everything up. I`d bet by bottom dollar (where did that phrase come from anyway smarty

) that once you have that seam sewed up no one will be able to even see it unless they get right up to it. hot drink

— Elaine · Jun 22, 01:07 PM · #

Thank you Elaine. This corner did turn out well. I updated the blog entry to add a picture of it.

I guess bottom dollar means that it is such a sure thing that one would risk their last dollar on it. Maybe that is it?? big smile

— Donna Young · Jun 22, 03:11 PM · #

It is beautiful Donna, so will you finish it this week or will it go back to the closet for another year?

I am pretty sure that you are correct about the bottom dollar thing, I say it all the time. It is a very mid-west saying.

Elaine, no wonder Ginger thinks you sound like me, it is not just our voices but probably the things we both say.

— MichielleRose · Jun 23, 09:55 AM · #