To Prewash or Not to Prewash . . . That is the Question!

There is a long-standing and sometimes very polarized discussion among quilters . . . prewash fabrics, or don't prewash fabrics. I have no idea when or where this practice started, but I know many quilters have strong opinions about it. Personally, I've done it both ways. I'll explain a little bit of why, then get to the real object of this post.

My first quilt was made for my son from preowned (and thus prewashed) men's shirts. I washed the fabric for the quilt because I was afraid it would shrink while the shirts had already done any shrinking they were going to do. After that quilt, I made several from fabrics that had not been prewashed, and did not find the shrinkage of much concern, especially since I like the crinkly feel of washed quilts and nearly always washed the quilts when they were complete.

Somewhere along the way, I decided to start starching some of my fabrics to control fraying and improve accuracy, and I loved the results! Then came the day when a starched navy print fabric (still wet) was slightly overlapping a cream print on the drying rack, and when dry, I was able to a see navy haze on the cream fabric where they had been in contact. That's when I really started paying attention to dye transfer.

I had always been told that "quality fabrics shrink less than 3%, and the colors don't bleed." I was always most concerned with the shrinkage, but have discovered that was the least of my worries. My real concern is now dye transfer. Color Grabbers by Carbona and Color Catchers by SC Johnson to the RESCUE!!

If you don't know what I'm talking about, here they are:

These can be found in the laundry aisle of most grocery stores, as well as Amazon. I have not found much difference in their performance, but if in doubt, put in one (or more) of each! These sheets work by attracting loose dye particles floating around the wash water, and absorbing them into the sheet, so there is less available dye to transfer to places you don't want it (like the white background of your quilt or lighter areas in the fabric itself).

At first, I was only using the sheets when washing completed quilts, to ensure no ill effects from dye transfer. I remember a particularly memorable time . . . (the quilt in question is shown in my gallery of work . . . it is the turquoise/teal bargello quilt). I was washing this quilt after it was completed, and because the fabrics are batiks, and since there is a big color difference between the turquoises and the light tans, I threw in two Color Catchers AND two Color Grabbers, just to make sure! All four sheets came out a pretty dark teal . . . and the creams and tans were still beautiful!

To demonstrate dye transfer, I handwashed some fabrics for an upcoming project, and photographed the resulting Color Grabbers that I used.

The sheets start out a nice bright white:

I used two in the sink when hand-washing 1/4 yard of red fabric with white stars. These are my two Color Grabbers after washing just a single 1/4 yard of fabric! I was stunned.

I washed a full yard of navy blue using two additional Color Grabbers, and the result wasn't nearly as bad, although certainly noticeable.

I later used the same two pink sheets from my 1/4 yard of red fabric, and washed another 1 yard of additional red fabric, and they darkened quite a bit more.

That brings up another question . . . can the sheets be used more than once? At first, I was tossing them much like a used dryer sheet. However, I read that they will continue to absorb, so now I use them repeatedly. To make sure I don't regret it, I usually throw in one new sheet each time. Apparently the dye does not transfer OUT of the sheets, so there is no reason not to continue using them as long as they keep getting darker with each use. I typically have about 6-8 in the machine when I wash fabric or a completed quilt. And because I have first-hand knowledge about how much fabrics can and do bleed, I almost always prewash fabrics. For precuts, I usually just go ahead and starch, and use a few extra new color catcher sheets when I wash the completed quilt.

Just so you know, the fabrics pictured at the top of this post are the ones I was washing, and they are true quilt-shop quality fabrics by Moda.

If you haven't been convinced, I hope you'll do your own test. Hopefully you will see how helpful these little sheets can be!