Our custom tartan placemat and runner set is now finally nearing finished. It hasn’t been on the top of the priority list as the recipient of this housewarming gift has not been in great health so we have been delaying a trip down there. Not a great excuse really so now suitably guilty I’ve sewn, cut up, and added bias binding edges to two placemats and have the other two plus the runner to go.

The reason for the bias binding is to do with selvedges on this tartan. As noted previously the number of warp ends or weft picks of each color in the pattern is always even – which means the overall tartan pattern is ‘square’. This also means that the weft yarn changes are always on one side. This is typically taken care of by running the non-woven colors up the selvedge, collecting them when wrapping around the floating selvedge.

Needless to say the left hand selvedge would be fine to leave as is, the right hand less so. If this were weaving yardage for a kilt the left hand selvedge would go to the bottom where there is generally no seam. The right hand selvedge would be covered with the top band.

The solution this time is to add bias binding around all edges.