A quilt made from hemp? Yes! And, it’s soft, cozy and warm just as you’d expect any quilt to be. This one is a simple, scrappy patchwork design made mostly from hemp summercloth, hemp canvas, hemp muslin, hemp herringbone; classic weaves of subtle textures and natural hues that showcase the beauty of this amazing bast fiber. Pieces of color grown organic cotton chambray and herringbone, and vintage linen twill are interspersed to add color depth and additional surface interest.
Read on to find out why hemp makes the best healthy home quilt, which batting to use in a hemp quilt and tips for “tinting” hemp fabric with coffee or tea to create a rich palette of naturals for your patchworks.
You might think hemp is an unlikely fabric for making a quilt. After all, for many years hemp fabric was offered only 3 ways: brown, stiff and coarse! Today, new eco-friendly bleaching, dyeing and finishing technologies are used to color and soften the cloth resulting in many more end-use options: throws, quilts, duvet covers, blankets, pillow cases, shower curtains and even sheets. Hemp is an ideal healthy home fabric. Crops flourishes without the need for toxic pesticides and fertilizers, the fiber can be processed with minimal water use and chemical input, and the finished fabric doesn’t off-gas harmful toxins. I’ve found hemp to be durable, breathable, keeps me cool in warm weather and warm in cool weather. Hemp Traders claims it doesn't wear out, it wears in. I agree!
Here are few things I learned when I made my hemp quilt:
1. Fabric Prep: pre-shrink all fabrics (hemp and any other fabric you combine it with) before you cut. Each hemp quality shrinks differently. Woven hemp fabrics ravel, especially in the wash. Serge or zigzag edges before you pre-shrink your yardage.
2. Tinting Hemp Fabric: the hemp fabrics I selected for my quilt started out all the same natural color called semi-bleached. I wanted more color depth within a natural palette so I dyed some of the canvas in coffee and some of the summercloth in black tea. Coffee will give the fabric a grayish brown tint and black tea results in a pinkish brown tint. Work with pre-washed fabric pieces no larger than a fat quarter or slightly larger depending on your pot or bowl. Here’s a basic step-by-step from Apartment Therapy.
3. Batting: I used Hobbs Heirloom Wool. I had it on-hand and thought it would add extra warmth, which it did. But it added extra weight too and a little too much body. That’s works for a throw size quilt, however, for a larger size patchwork I’d go with a lighter weight, thinner batting made of organic cotton or Pacafil, an alpaca cotton blend that is thin, soft and warm. Keep in mind a patchwork of mostly hemp fabrics will be heavier than one made of quilters cotton.
4. Stitching: Instead of using an allover stitch design I recommend an engineered stitch placement. For example, the leaf stitch shown here starts and stops within the length of every 2 patches. The stitch lines don’t cross over the seam intersections as they would in an allover pattern. That’s because the thickness of the hemp fabrics create too much bulk. A long quilting machine will have trouble traveling across the patchwork evenly.
I hope you'll try making your own unique hemp quilt. You'll enjoy it for years to come.
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