Binding 101 - Part One: Trimming the quilt and preparing the binding strips

Here is part one of my step by step binding tutorial.

I always find this the hardest part of writing instructions and patterns, so I decided to take step by step photos as I did the binding on the Modern Triangle Sampler. There are many different approaches to binding but this is the method I have tweaked over the years to suit me.

Binding 101

Part One - Trimming your quilt

Once the quilting is complete, trim your quilt. If there is a handy seam close to the edge, I use a ruler and measure from this seam to the outside so that I can keep this distance the same. Cut with a rotary cutter. Here I can see that if I use the 4 1/8" line on this border, I can trim the outside edge close enough so I won't see any batting when I sew on my binding.

Line the ruler against the border seam and trim

When you get to a corner, use the ruler to keep everything square. Square corners will be your friend!

2. Preparing the binding strips

First you need to work out how many strips you will need. Measure the quilt. Say you have a 48" by 60" quilt.

2 side at 48" = 96"

2 sides at 60" = 120"

Total distance around the quilt = 216"

Divide this by the width of fabric (40") = 5.4

You need to round this up to the next whole number so this quilt would need 6 binding strips. If the number is higher, say 5.9, you might need 7 strips once you take account of corners and joining the ends.

I cut my binding strips 2 1/4" by the width of fabric. Once the strips are cut, join them on the diagonal:

Lay two strips right sides together at right angles and sew on the diagonal

Join all the strips together like this until you have one long strip. Trim each of the seams to 1/4", then press them open.

Trim seams to 1/4"

Press seams open

Now press the whole long strip of binding wrong sides together.

Press the binding strip wrong sides together

That's it, your binding is ready to attach to the quilt. Carry on to part two ....