Twirling Ribbons- pieced binding

This is my latest pattern, Twirling Ribbons. Below is the wallhanging size 34″ x 47″. Add two more borders to make a small lap quilt, 45″ x 57″. The fabric is Saddle River by Timeless Treasure. It is beautiful! You can see it here.

I designed this quilt with asymmetrical borders. The left and bottom have a pieced border, ending with another narrow border, which is on the top also. The right side ends with the second border and is a different fabric than the other three sides.

Then I took it one step further and decided to have the binding match the border.

I matched the binding to the border fabric—top, bottom, left side and all four corners are the Fabric 4, and most of the right side is Fabric 3.

Normally, I wouldn’t join binding strips with a straight seam, but I did join both seams connecting the two fabrics with straight seams and pressed the seams open. First of all I joined the top of the Fabric 3 strip (right) to a strip of the Fabric 2 (left).

I pressed the seam open.

Fold it in half WST as usual and match the binding seam to the seam where the borders meet (the top right corner of the quilt); pin (you will need to remove this pin when you start to sew).

Back up to the corner and fold the binding as if turning the corner as usual, only backwards.

Smooth the binding back about 6 or 7”.

Remove the first pin where you matched the binding seam to the border seam. Start sewing (at about the 24″ mark in the picture) and turn the corner, as usual.

The binding seam matches the seam between the borders.

Sew down to about 12” from the corner. Go to the ironing board. With the binding open, lay it against the quilt and fold it back on itself, WST, folding it so that the fold touches the Fabrics 2/3 border seam. (The fold is between the i and g in “Designs” below.)

Press a crease. I glue basted this seam, placing a fine line of washout glue on the fold (where I just pressed a crease) of the Fabric 3 binding. I laid the end of the Fabric 2 binding RST on the glued edge, overlapping at least ¼”; press to set.

Open up the binding, mark a line in the fold of the Fabric 3 strip and stitch on the line to join the binding strips. Trim the seam and press this seam open also. Fold the binding WST and continue on back to the starting point in the usual manner. The remaining binding seams should be joined with diagonal seams and pressed open. Join the end of the binding to the start of the binding as usual.

And there you have it, a unique binding technique, easily done! I hope you’ll try it!