North Channel Designs

T-Shirt quilts are a wonderful way to preserve memories of school, athletics, travels and other events, long after the T-shirts are banished to the back of your closet.  T-Shirt quilts make great graduation gifts, and are the perfect to send with your son or daughter when they go to college.

At North Channel Designs I carefully prepare all T-shirts with a lightweight fusible backing to prevent stretching and to stabilize the T-shirt fabric.  Then the T-shirt designs are cut to size.  Design elements from back, front, and sleeves can be combined into one block, or used in separate blocks. 

The t-shirt blocks can be sewn directly together, or separated by "sashing strips", to frame each block.   An outer border is added to act as a frame for the entire quilt.  You can choose any color of fabric you want for the sashing and borders, such as team or school colors.  A simple, monochromatic fabric usually looks best to focus attention on the t-shirts. 

              
Click for a larger picture of each quilt.

The same fabric can be used for the backing, but it can be fun to use a wild, large scale print or to add some interest to the overall design.  All fabrics are high quality, 100% cotton. 

The center of the quilt sandwich is the batting.  I use high quality batting from Hobbs.  You can choose from a flat batting, or a high-loft batting for a more puffy look.  For children's quilts, I can also use "Warm and Safe" batting, which is a fire retardant all cotton batting.















Some T-shirt quilt companies simply tie the quilts to hold the 3 layers together, use spot tacking, or simply stitch around each block.  This results in sagging, bunching, and a quilt that will not last through normal use and washing.  Your T-shirt quilt will be beautifully quilted with an overall design on a longarm quilting machine.  This adds another design element, but more importantly, adds strength and stability so your quilt can last as long as the memories it holds.