We are so lucky to have such an active, wonderful guild, and one of our biggest goals this year is to build community together. Our amazing VP of Membership, Renee Pype, sent a PMQG quilt label as happy mail to each 2021 member, and we would love to have you join us for a Telling Our Quilts’ Stories event, this Thursday, March 11 at 6 pm! The link and info for this special Quilter Filter is all on the Members page here on our site - please email the guild with any questions.
I wanted to share some tips on labeling your quilts - these photos are from my process of using a brand-new PMQG label to tell the story of one of our special guild-made quilts from 2012, Improv! This beautiful quilt is one of three in a series, made with 16 blocks sewn by our incredibly talented members for a Michael Miller Cotton Couture challenge. More on the story in a minute, let’s get to the basics of getting that label on your quilt - whether it’s from this month or nine years ago!
Let’s start at the beginning - preparing and writing on your label. The PMQG labels are a nice quality cotton from Spoonflower that takes handwriting beautifully. I recommend using something grippy as a base when you’re writing on fabric - either a fine/medium grade sandpaper, or freezer paper. This will stabilize the label and make the pen flow more smoothly instead of catching on the fabric weave or skipping around. For pens, I recommend a Micron in the size of your choice. I personally like the 05 size in dark brown or black. It’s wonderful quality and available for $2-3 at art supply stores (I buy mine at collage). Any archival/acid-free pen will work fine, though!
Now for what to write… this is so personal, and totally up to you. The basics are its name, your name, any collaborators’ names, the date/year, where it was made, and anything else you’re excited about! Leave at least 1/4” space around your writing on all sides for a seam allowance - a bit more is better. For this quilt, there’s lots of detail to share, so I hand-wrote a draft on paper to get all the information down. I wanted to share the gift of fabric from Kathy Miller, the eight colors we chose for members to work with, and the timeline, and hopefully capture a bit of the excitement we all felt working with these beautiful solids for the first time!
Since 16 members contributed blocks, I added an extra mini-label to name each of them, in rows reflecting their block placement. This is great for a bee or collective quilt or if it’s shown in multiple places, won awards, or has other backstory you don’t want to skimp on.
I’ll go over this whole process in more detail at our event, but one of my favorite methods of adding a label is to back it with plain white fabric or muslin. (There are a couple simpler options too I’ll mention later!) Place your label face down over the backing fabric and stitch around the perimeter with a scant 1/4” seam allowance, leaving an opening on the bottom edge to turn it later. Clip the corners and press.
I wanted to include a detail of the extra label that’s just written on plain white quilting cotton to show the same kind of process, whether it’s a printed label or not. Carefully turn the label right side out, using a pencil or chopstick to open out the corners. Press, tucking the raw edges inside the label sandwich evenly so they are straight and smooth.
Pin your label (in this case, labelS!) to the back of your quilt, positioning it so it’s parallel with the bound edges. I like to add my labels in the bottom right corner but it’s totally up to you! Pin each side down securely, especially the bottom with the opening in the stitching.
Slip-stitch around the perimeter of the label (similar to how you might hand-bind), taking special care with the bottom to securely close the opening with your hand stitches. I use a regular sewing needle and white or off-white Gutermann thread. Knot securely at the back, under the label.
On the left bottom corner you’ll see our original 2012 label (when the quilts went to NW Quilting Expo and Sisters), with the finished 2021 labels on the right. I love the contrast between the creative approach sharing the most important but minimal information (we hadn’t even voted to choose the name yet - it was a busy year!) and the new one with so much more of the story included. It’s really so satisfying to see it all together.
I recorded lots of these details in my 2012 sketchbook (I was PMQG president that year). Our amazing board planned the challenge out in February with the generous support of Kathy Miller, got the bolts of Cotton Couture in early March, met up to cut and fold scores of fat eighths at Nancy’s studio, and gave every paid member a surprise beautiful stack of solids at our March meeting!
These are swatches of the colors we chose as a board - and my planning for my own block (which ended up in Improv’s sister quilt, Graphic!).
We got 47 beautiful blocks back at our April meeting - it was incredible to see them all together taped up on the wall! (Trying to find a photo of that to add!) The board met at Nancy’s studio again and organized them into three themes to design cohesive quilt tops - evolving into Improv, Graphic, and Linear. I quickly captured everyone’s name (first at least!) in the order of the final blocks layout. There’s one block that didn’t have a name with it (a circular design in the second row of Graphic) and we never succeeded in tracking it down. I still hope that we’ll find the maker, though!
Here is Improv, hanging at Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show in our first guild special exhibit there, among quilts from dozens of our members! It was so exciting to see it in the show, and so many of us made the trip to celebrate.
I’ll be labeling Graphic on Thursday as part of our Telling Our Quilts’ Stories community event, and would love to see you there! Thank you to the many members who contributed blocks to these beautiful quilts, and all who have joined us since to create our lively, vibrant, amazing guild. We are so lucky to be together in such an isolating and lonely year!
P.S. I mentioned some alternate ways to add your label - here is a quick look at some of those.
•You can machine-stitch the pressed and backed label down instead of hand-stitching it - a great option for a bed quilt that will be washed and dried, if you don’t mind the perimeter stitching showing on the front of the quilt.
•For a wall quilt that won’t be washed or used often, you can do the same basic technique using fusible interfacing as a backing, then turn right sides out and iron it down without stitching.
•For a quicker one-layer label, clip corners, press each edge of the label under 1/4”, pin it carefully in place (it won’t be as stable as a two-layer label) and machine-stitch down.
•Stitch your label down (or even piece it into your back before quilting), stitching the binding right over the side and bottom of the label if you like.
-Susan Beal, PMQG historian + 2021 Programs Coordinator for Meetings