Sewists Unite
Crazy About Low Volume Fabrics! Plus a Free Low Volume Quilt Pattern!
A Little Quiet Inspiration
Many years ago, I stumbled on and pinned a lovely quilt in Pinterest. After some digging I found out that it was made by Jeannette Bruce and posted originally on her Gone Aussie Quilting blog.
I loved the scrappy nature of it, but I also really loved the mix of low volume fabrics. It was wonderful to see how she incorporated lots of colours, some black and white, and different coloured backgrounds (stark whites, creams and taupes). I've been collecting pictures of other low volume quilts ever since, but this one always stayed with me.
A Little About Low Volume Fabrics
My affection for these subtle prints is real. I have been collecting low volume fabrics for my personal stash for quite a long time and we always make sure we have a fantastic mix of low volume fabrics in the shop.
But, low volume can mean different things to different people. It can be white on white or, for some of us, a stripe or a strong dot.
I kind of vaguely use the 60/40 rule, meaning the fabric shouldn't feature more than 40% of colour. I also count a pale pastel as low volume.
Getting to Work
This past holiday season, I was tired of all of my current sewing projects and found myself running out of room in my fabric storage. Given this, I decided to start cutting into my stash in a serious way.
I returned to Jeannette's project for inspiration and started making 2" strips from my large bin of low volume fabrics (Jeannette used 1 1/2" strips, but I'm not quite that patient!). From there I figured out an assembly method that worked for me, and before I knew it, I had about 25 of the fun diagonal strip blocks.
I was using scraps of all lengths at this point, but decided that I'd produce less waste and could incorporate more colour if I came into the store to cut additional skinny quarters (9" x width of fabric). So, that's what I did.
My Low Volume Quilt
I kept working on it through the holidays and then added a couple of blocks whenever I had time to sit down and sew.I laid it out on my floor several different times trying to get a good random and scrappy feel to the placement of the blocks.
And this is the result!
My quilt is a little quieter than the original, and features a few more hits of neon (because I love that!). It also has less brown, more blue and pink, and a yellow striped binding that I'm smitten with.
As much as I love colour and a lot of dense pattern, this quilt is my new favourite. There is a reason I couldn't get that lovely Aussie quilt out of my head!
It's peaceful and comforting to have a lot of negative space in a surface design and that's essentially what a low volume quilt is. There are many places for the eye to rest, but it's not boring. It also feels a little like one of the very old quilts made by my great aunts that stayed in the family for years.
The Big Low Volume Fabric Bundle
We started talking about our favourite low volumes prints in the store and began building a pile of bolts that had the same feeling as my quilt.
We had the single objective of making the ultimate low volume bundle (which included many of the fabrics I used in the sample above.)
Voila! Here are 32 skinny quarters in one bountiful bundle! You can purchase it here while supplies last. The bundle is equivalent to 8 yards of fabric. We made sure to include a wide mix of colour, pattern, density and tones. We also included some text prints, graphic images, simple florals, and many many background colours.
FREE Low Volume Quilt Pattern
We wrote up the directions for making a strip block quilt like mine. You can download them here for FREE! Our quilt sample measures 64" x 80". You can see it in the shop, or in our booth at Quilt Canada 2025.
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