On a rag quilt, the width of the seam allowance decides far more than the amount of fringe running along each seam. It shapes the very character of that fringe, the way it sits, the way it catches the light, and the way the whole quilt reads from across a room. Two quilts sewn to the very same plan, one with a narrow allowance and one with a wide one, come out looking like two quite different things.
A narrow seam allowance gives you a short, dense fringe that packs tightly together and reads almost as chenille, soft and plush and close. A wider allowance opens everything up, giving the looser, more tousled and unmistakably rag look that most people picture when they think of these quilts. Neither is right nor wrong. They are two different finishes, and the seam allowance is the dial you turn between them.
This came to light in a quilt where the first rows had been sewn with a narrower allowance than intended. Rather than unpicking them and beginning again, the choice was made to carry that same narrower allowance right through the whole quilt for the sake of consistency. What it would actually do to the fringe stayed hidden until the quilt came out of its first wash, and only then did the difference show itself.
What the narrower seam changes
- Density over openness: With less fabric turned into the seam, the cut ends fall closer together in proportion, so the fringe crowds in and drifts towards chenille rather than the open rag look.
- A longer finished quilt: Less fabric disappears inside the seams, so the finished quilt comes out larger than the original plan allowed for, gaining a little in both directions.
- Kinder on the hands: Keeping the same spacing between snips means each snip is shorter, which eases the strain on the hands across the hundreds of cuts a rag quilt asks for.
- Every layer in the fringe: Cutting all three layers to exactly the same size brings the inner flannel layer into the fringe as well, adding body and fullness the outer layers alone would never give.
The look straight out of that first wash is not the look you are left with. A rag fringe keeps opening and softening over the next several wash and dry cycles, blooming a little more each time, so it is worth judging over weeks rather than on the first day. Along the way there are loose threads to see to, the ones that cling on instead of dropping away. Deal with those first by pulling and trimming them, and then run a lint roller across the whole surface to lift whatever is left.
One more thing worth planning for is dye. Even with every fabric washed beforehand, a pairing of red and navy can give off enough colour in the wash to saturate three dye catching sheets. It is worth reaching for one more than the load looks likely to need, so nothing has the chance to travel where it should not.
Cutting fringe, snip after snip after snip, asks a great deal of a blade, and a dull edge makes itself known long before the last seam is done. Our titanium coated collection is built to hold a keen edge through heavy, repetitive cutting, the very thing a rag quilt calls for. Have a look and treat your hands to a tool that stays sharp.
Turn that little dial with intention, and the fringe you finish with will be the fringe you meant to make all along.
