For those of you who are fortunate enough to have quilting shops nearby, you should be able to get most of your basic quilting supplies there and it is great if you can support your local shops. If you live in a quilting wasteland and do not have a suitable shop nearby, all quilting supplies can be bought online. Shop around to find the best prices.
There are many fabric manufacturers who supply pre-cuts. Some do the full range and others just certain ones. The ones who produce the largest range are Moda and Robert Kaufman but Freespirit, Riley Blake and other quilting fabric manufacturers also now produce them.
For those of you online, an internet search will bring you a host of shops that sell pre-cuts, but don’t forget when you are searching that the names of pre-cuts vary between manufacturers. Once you find what you are looking for, it pays to shop around, as the cost can vary massively from shop to shop as do shipping costs.
There are also many quilting shops – both bricks and mortar, and online – that put their own pre-cuts and bundles together. These can provide the most interesting fabric combinations as all fabrics in a pre-cut won’t necessarily be from the same line, so ask at your local quilting store to see whether they do. Don’t forget that you can also cut your own!
There are a couple of specialist rulers used in this book:
• Jenny Pedigo’s curved ruler is available at many online stores but can be purchased directly from Jenny at: www.sewkindofwonderful.com
• 22.5 degree rulers are available in a couple of different versions but I recommend the Nifty Notions Cut For The Cure ruler. Not only is it a great ruler but a percentage of the sales also go to the The Chicagoland Affiliate of The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.
The Giant’s Causeway quilt is an English paper piecing project that requires a paper template to wrap your fabric around. These can easily be cut by photocopying the templates in the book, stapling them to a couple of additional sheets of printer paper and then cutting them out. There is also a great website from where you can print templates out directly from your computer – www.incompetech.com. If you go to the graph paper section and select the shape you want, you can then specify the size of shape you require and download a PDF. The Giant’s Causeway quilt uses 2in (5cm) hexagons and 2in (5cm) squares. You can also buy pre-cut paper shapes at www.paperpieces.com.
There are mountains of inspiration out there on the internet, without which I wouldn’t be quilting at all! Here’s a few websites you may find useful:
Fat Quarterly (www.fatquarterly.com)
Fat Quarterly is an e-zine (electronic magazine) for modern stitchers, by stitchers and was started by members of the online modern quilting community. New issues of Fat Quarterly are released four times per year and each issue is full of original patterns and project ideas from members of the creative community, features of new fabric lines, articles about developments in the sewing and quilting industry, and interviews. It has a supporting blog so drop in and say Hi!
Flickr (www.flickr.com)
Flickr is an amazing source of inspiration and great for those of you who live in quilting wastelands and have friends and family who don’t understand why you are hoarding bits of fabric and constantly have bits of thread stuck to your socks. There is a massive quilting community on Flickr who all post pictures of their amazing sewing/craft projects. There are groups, quilting bees, swaps and quilt-a-longs for you to get involved with and make new friends all over the world.
Quilting Gallery (www.quiltinggallery.com)
Quilting Gallery is a good place to meet thousands of quilters from around the world in the quilting bloggers directory, and browse the quilt shop locator for quilting retailers and professionals. There is a world-wide directory of quilt guilds and a quilter’s market area where you can get all the latest on quilting books, patterns and notions.
Sewing Directory (www.sewingdirectory.co.uk)
A great website to find sewing suppliers (both local and online), sewing courses, groups, and general sewing news. It is full of information, inspiration, articles and a great resource for the quilters based in the UK.
Twitter (www.twitter.com)
There is a huge community on Twitter, chatting and posting pictures of their work. It’s a great place to see what the craft folks are up to and to get advice quickly. It’s fast paced and fun, although beware, it is addictive.