Pattern samples for customers

[Ljones 0]

Been quilting for customers about two years now and thought it might be nice to put together a sample free motion pattern “book” of my patterns for customers to choose from. I don’t want to spend tons of time putting this together only to say, darn, I should’ve done it that way!  Any suggestions or pictures?   

Options I’ve thought about. 

3 ring binder  First thought of putting samples in protective sheets but noticed that the texture of the patterns is completely lost.  Second thought is to just add 3 grommets to the samples and put them in the binder.

simple O ring with samples hanging from corner grommet

[Sharon Deming 142]

I use the book-ring and plastic sleeve method. I primarily use pantographs, so I pull the thumbnail image from the seller's website, enlarge it to fit on a regular piece of copy paper, put it in a sleeve protector, and voila. The rings work better than a binder, because I can easily "audition" the printed sample on the quilt top to see if it seems suitable.

[ffq-lar 3,599]

To teach a class on overall designs, I used length of good white fabric as the backer (about 1 1/2 yards), some poly batting to show off the quilting, and a pale pastel batik on the top. I used my channel locks to divide an area and filled each with a different overall design. I used lots of different thread types, weights, and colors for options, both top and bobbin. Now I had a sampler of my personal stitching, what threads looked like on white and colored fabric, how colored thread looks when used in the bobbin, how density affects the feel of the quilt, etc. It was fun to make and when I suggest "something leafy" or "maybe geometric" I hang it up for my customer to look at. For the leafy meander, I showed many kinds and shapes of leaves. And sometimes changed the pattern to another similar one within the area.

[InesR 135]

Wow

[Ljones 0]

Thank you for your thoughts!

[Gator 469]

Great ideas, especially for the most popular designs.