The Ultimate Guide to Fabric Yardage and Precuts
I don’t know about you, but I HATE feeling stupid.
Have you ever noticed that different jobs, sports, and hobbies seem to come with their own language that a person on the outside just doesn't understand??? In graphic design we have words like KERN and VECTOR that probably mean nothing to most people. When I worked in a restaurant in college, by the end of a busy night we’d have a list of menu items that had been 86-ed, and the wait staff got upset when we had CAMPERS at our tables. On my girls’ soccer team they get really excited when a player gets a HAT TRICK or someone does a NUTMEG.
It can be REALLY ANNOYING to not know what people are talking about — especially when you’re trying something new and already feel more than a bit overwhelmed.
And you know where there’s a whole lot of jargon? — At a fabric store. Hearing them talk, you may even be wondering if you stumbled into a bakery by accident! Layer cake? Jelly roll? We’re still talking about fabric, right?
Not to mention, I may know how much fabric I need in inches, but yards???? Just how long is a yard anyway???
Never fear! If you’ve ever shied away from stepping into your local quilt shop for fear of being exposed as a newbie, first off, be assured that most shops are full of the nicest, most generous people who are more than willing to help you out. But second, if you’d still like to be armed with a little knowledge before entering, I’m here to help give you a basic rundown of some of the language used around fabric yardage and quilting precuts.
YARD | WOF x 36”
1 yard of fabric is 36 inches (or 3 feet) long x its width (width of fabric or WOF).
Quilting and apparel weight fabric are generally 42" – 44", but others such as home decor fabric are commonly 54", 72", or 118" wide. No matter how wide the fabric is though, it is still sold by the yard.
Though some large box fabric stores will cut and sell fabric as small as 2 inches long, most local quilt shops measure and cut the yard in increments of fourths, thirds, or eighths. Additionally, you'll find that quilt or clothing patterns will list fabric requirements using these same measuring standards.
When "sewing from yardage" this is how you specify to the quilt shop how much fabric you would like cut off from the full bolt of fabric. See the reference chart to see how these typical partial yard cuts are broken down in inches.
FAT QUARTER | ~22" x 18"
At a fabric store, you can purchase ¼ yard of fabric two different ways. If you just ask for one fourth yard of fabric, they'll cut you a long skinny piece of fabric that measures 9 inches long x WOF.
BUT — if you were to purchase a precut FAT QUARTER, the shop would have cut a full yard in half by its width and by its length, making your fat quarter 18 inches long by about 22 inches wide (depending on the actual width of the fabric).
FAT EIGHTH | ~11" x 18" OR ~22" x 9"
A Fat Eighth works very similar to the Fat Quarter. If you were to ask for an Eighth of a yard, they would cut a piece 4.5 inches long x WOF. But a Fat Eighth starts with a Fat Quarter and is then cut in half either vertically or horizontally depending on the person doing the cutting.
FAT QUARTER BUNDLE
Often shops will sell a group of Fat Quarters together in a bundle. These may be a curated stack of various quarter yard precut fabrics that someone decided all looked well together, or it may be a single cut piece of every fabric from a designer's collection. There is no standard on how many pieces make up a bundle, but they can be a fun way to build up your fabric stash and allow you a chance to work with a lot of different fabrics.
Sometimes you can also find these bundles created from Fat Eighths or Half Yards.
JELLY ROLL | 2.5" x WOF
A Jelly Roll is a bundle of precut fabric strips that measure 2.5 inches wide by 44"–45" long, depending on the width of the fabric. Most Jelly Roll bundles contain 40 strips of fabric in a variety of coordinating prints and colors. When buying a Jelly Roll from a specific fabric collection, there may be more than one of each fabric to bring the total number of strips to 40.
You can find many quilt patterns that were designed specifically to be sewn from Jelly Rolls.
MINI CHARM PACK | 2.5"
Made up of 42 precut 2.5" squares, which equal a little over ¼ yard of fabric, these are great for small patchwork projects that require an assortment of coordinating prints.
CHARM PACK | 5"
Made up of 42 precut 5" squares, which equal about ⅝ of a yard.
LAYER CAKE | 10"
Made up of 42 precut 10" squares, equally about 2 ¾ yards of fabric. This size is considered perfect for scrappy quilters to build their fabric stash since you can often get enough from a few squares to make a complete block.
I hope this information helps you feel more confident next time you head to your local or online fabric store. Please let me know if I missed anything — I've been sewing since I was about 12 years-old, but still feel like I'm always discovering something new! I'd love to add it to the list so we all can learn if there's anything I left out!
