tips fpr quilting black on black featured image

Tips for Working with Black on Black with Heather Hopkins

This post was originally posted on heatherhopkinsquilts.wordpress.com 

If you find working with black thread on black fabric tricky like me, here is a tip that may just help you!

I wanted to stitch a channel around this block 1/2″ out from the seam line but I struggled to see the seam line to get my ruler lined up with it.

I could have chalked/marked the line in, but I didn’t want to mark this client’s quilt. In coming – blue painters’ tape. It has 1001 uses, and that’s just for quilting!

tips quilting black on black 2

I have taken a piece of blue painter’s tape and stuck it along the seam/ditch. I can then line my ruler up on the edge of the blue tape to get my stitch line. (On my ruler I am using the first 1/4″ marked line on the ruler against the tape + the width of my foot = 1/2″ out from the ditch).

tips quilting black on black 3

I used the same piece of tape and moved it to the next seam/ditch and continued around the block.

tips quilting black on black 4tips quilting black on black 5About the Quilt:
  • Quilt pattern is Night Sky by Jaybird Quilts
  • Pieced by Julie M
  • Custom quilted by me (Heather Hopkins) – on a Handi Quilter Infinity
  • Quilt size 120″ x 120″, over 1 million stitches, close to 17hrs of actual stitch time (needle going up & down),19 bobbins (@215yds each) and 28 thread colour changes.
  • LEach coloured block was quilted using rulers and free motion fill designs.
  • The black background I used the straight ruler to get the 1/2″ channel line, I used one computerized design from my ProStitcher between the blocks (the star in the circle) then free hand filled the rest of the black background.

It was a repetitive quilt but super fun to do!

Rulers used: