ALL of my original quilt designs on BOMquilts.com are beginner friendly.  I try to chose colors that either compliment or coordinate with the quilt pattern I design.  But, one thing my patterns don’t always show is how to pick out fabrics that will make a quilt statement but not be a problem for a beginning quilter.  This is mostly because my friend Linda at AbbiMays.com kits the quilts with fabrics I’ve chosen.

But what if a beginning quilter wants to use some of her stash…or go to her local fabric store to purchase the fabrics?

My biggest tip to new quilters is to avoid fabrics that have directional patterns on them.  This would include gingham or stripes.  Unless you fussy-cut each part of these types of fabrics, you will find that the directional patterns in the fabric do not line up and when looking at the finished quilt, it seems that those areas are what catches the eye very quickly and then you can’t seem to get past them to look at the quilt as a whole.

Let me give an example:

This is a directional fabric.  The dots/flowers are all lined up in symmetrical rows.

This is a non-directional fabric.  The flowers are artfully splattered all over the fabric with no clear direction.

If you are a beginning quilter, do you see the difference in the two fabrics?  My best suggestion to you is to stay away from directional fabrics until you are more comfortable with fussy-cutting and/or making sure the pattern on the fabric is going in the same direction in your quilt.

And to find JOY in quilting, you want whatever you make to be a special quilt without compromising the integrity of the quilt pattern with directional fabrics.