Complete FAQs

Typically 4 to 6 weeks.

Thought, it will depend on the time of year. Around Christmas and during high school graduation season, it may be closer to 6 to 8 weeks. In January and in August it could be closer to 3 weeks. If it will be longer than 6 weeks, we will let you know. 

If you have a specific date that you need to have your quilt returned by, please indicate this on your order form so we can plan accordingly. 

Note: The turn around time clock begins upon your approval of the size of your quilt. We try to email you size and border options within 2-4 days of receiving your box. We do not start counting time until we hear back from you approving your quilts size. The time does not begin when you ship out your T-shirts.  Please note this in your time frame.

It’s hard to say! It all depends on your specific T-shirts. The list here is only an approximation of the number of T-shirts, sweatshirts or other clothing items it may take to make a quilt of that size.

You may need more T-shirts if the designs on your T-shirts are small. Or you may need fewer if the designs on your T-shirts are big. Count each T-shirt you have as one, whether it has a design just on the front or a design on the front and back. The more T-shirts you have with fronts and backs means you will need to be on the lower end on the approximate number needed. If you have T-shirts with small designs on just one side, you will need more T-shirts.

Generally, we take the T-shirts you send us and cut them. Then we determine what size quilt those T-shirts could make. We will e-mail you and tell you the dimensions of the quilt that these T-shirts can make. At this time you can accept the dimensions of the quilt or you can add or remove T-shirts so the quilt is the size you would like.

Notes:

• We can make your quilt whatever size your T-shirts will allow. So, you might have a quilt that is in between standard sizes. Whatever size your quilt is, the size will be divisible by four.
• Concert T-shirts tend to have large designs on the front and backs of them. They almost go two to one of typical T-shirts. Keep this in mind when you are counting out your T-shirts.

Yes, we can use sweatshirts. Once they are in your quilt, it's difficult to tell them apart from T-shirts.

We also can use jersey material - the knit material with holes in it that is used in some football and hockey jerseys. Read more about what you can use here.

A Too Cool Style T-shirt Quilt

A spectacular T-shirt quilt made from your T-shirts.  All the blocks will be different sizes and it will be puzzled together. 

Quilt Binding Your Choice of Color

All Too Cool T-shirt Quilts come with a binding. 

The binding is the material that goes around the outside of the quilt. About ¼" of the binding is seen from the top, the side and the back of a quilt. The binding is used to hide the raw edges of the quilt top, batting and backing materials. 

Our Spectacular Individualized Quilting

The quilting designs on the back of a Too Cool T-shirt quilt are not only fun, they are one of the things that set a Too Cool T-shirt quilt apart from other T-shirt quilts. 

Return Shipping

Return shipping is included in the price of a quilt. There are two exceptions... 

1. Additional shipping charges for Alaska, Hawaii and International orders.
2. Return of Scraps or a lot of extra unused T-shirts. 

Backing colors - we have over 350 colors to choose from.

If you want something beyond a standard generally accepted colors, please send a swatch. For example navy, hunter green, red, orange, etc. are colors that are what they are.

But a color like teal or sage - there is more than one interpretation to these colors. So if you would send a swatch of color that would be helpful. You can get a swatch from a paint chip, from one of your T-shirts, a color crayon scribble on a piece of white paper or out of a magazine (circle the color).

No. There are any number of items that can be used in a T-shirt quilt. We can use most items that are machine washable.

But for the stained-glass style quilt we would prefer to work with items that are not 3D.

Read more about what we can use in your T-shirt quilt here.

Some work better than others, but here is a list of some of the things that we have used...

Just about any part! Front, back, sleeves and even the neck line. We can use a front and a back from the same T-shirt. We also can use the legs or the butt from pants or shorts. So you are not limited!

We will use every part of your T-shirt unless it is "X"-ed out with blue painters masking tape. You are welcome to put notes on your T-shirts if you have a special request. Please write these notes on blue painters masking tape. This way the note can stay attached to the T-shirt until we have the quilt top sewn together.

We have found that paper notes that are pinned or stapled on leave holes in the T-shirts and are difficult to work with when we are cutting and sewing.

We can use T-shirts with the following problems:

• T-shirts with a holes in them
• T-shirts that are old and thin
• T-shirts with faded text 
• T-shirt with letters falling off
• T-shirt with the designs peeling off
• T-shirt that have already been cut

We will fix them up and "save" them for you.

If you want a T-shirt in your quilt, send it. If it's too far gone, we will let you know. We can save 99% of the T-shirts we are sent!

Read more about T-shirt condition issues here. 

No. It would ruin the quilt. So please choose and mark your T-shirts carefully.

YES WE CAN! See the 'Already Cut T-shirts' page for more information.

Yes!

Have your photographs printed on white T-shirt material. We would suggest that you have the photos professionally printed. We have found that the iron on transfers, done at home, do not hold up over time. 

We don't do photo transfers here at Too Cool T-shirt Quilts. We don't have the equipment or expertise. 

If you don't have someone local to do your transfer, we would suggest One Hour Tees. Tell them that Too Cool T-shirts Quilts sent you!

Too Cool T-shirt Quilts does not have the facilities to do embroidery here.

But we do have a friend that is happy to help out. Her name is Angie. Her website is Marble Hill Designs. 

No. It would ruin the quilt.

Generally we don't do anything about stains. We consider them to be part of the memory of the T-shirts. But not everyone feels that way.

On the order form we have options for directing us how to use T-shirts with stains. We can ignore the stains or cut them off if they are on the outside of the design.

If the stain is on the design, we can ignore it. Or we can cut out the stain and put a piece of matching material behind the hole. This is a radical fix and will not look as good as the design with the stain on it.

If there is a stain you want removed, please mark the area with a piece of blue painters masking tape. Write on the tape what you would like us to do.

There are many different ways to hang your T-shirt quilt, check out this article about  "How to Hang a Quilt" for more information.

Do you need to make your T-shirts go further? You have a few options.

1. We can cut your T-shirts “big”. This means that there is more space around the design than we would normally cut. If you think that we need to cut your T-shirts big, let us know before we begin cutting.
2. We can also make your quilt larger by adding squares of bright colored T-shirt material. 
3. A border can be added around the quilt to make the quilt larger.
4. A border and extra block combination is also possible.

In the quilt below, we were short on T-shirts to make the quilt the size the customer wanted. So, we added colored squares of T-shirt material and a border to make the quilt larger.

• Start with our "how many T-shirts" chart.
• Count T-shirts and not graphics.
• Know that a border decreases the number of T-shirts you need.
• Send a “if needed” bag of T-shirts.

Then you will need to accept the size quilt those T-shirts will make. 

When you have a lot of T-shirts and only want a small quilt, you will need to make some choices.

1. Make the quilt larger
2. Remove some pieces

If you know ahead of time that you might have too many T-shirts for the size quilt you are looking for, you can do a few things.

1. Pack your T-shirts into sets. The first set would be the T-shirts that must go into the quilt. The second grouping would be T-shirts that we can cut from if we need to make your quilt larger.
2. Keep a list of the T-shirts you send so if necessary, you can tell us what to remove.

Pricing includes all materials; **return shipping and our spectacular individualized quilting.

**Additional shipping charges for Alaska, Hawaii and International orders.

Yes. If you choose to use a credit card for payment, please indicate so on your order form. When your quilt is finished we will send you a "ransom" photo of the quilt and then you can call with your credit card number. Upon receipt of your payment, we will send you your quilt.

No. The price of the quilt is what it cost us to make the quilt. 

No. We have found that they rarely are used.

All sales are final.

Our products are custom-made and uniquely yours. We are committed to ensuring your quilt or pillow meets your expectations within our capabilities.

If you are paying by check, please include a check for half the estimated cost of your quilt. If you are planning on paying with a credit card, you do not need to include a check or a deposit.

m&m's of course! Here's an article about best practices for shipping your T-shirts. 

Yes, please. 

Wash

We ask that you wash your items in scent free detergent. If you don't have any, please wash in backing soda and vinegar.

Why? So we don't sneeze and get boogers on your T-shirts!  Gross, I know. But it's life.

Dry

Dry your T-shirts without dryer sheets. Again, sneezing. 

Please keep your request for placement of T-shirts down to just a few. The more specific placements you request, the less flexibility we will have in laying out your quilt. This can result in a less interesting quilt design.

Marking your T-shirts is very important and a key step in our communications. These directions are specific to Too Cool T-shirt Quilts and help us to understand exactly what graphics you don't want in your quilt.

Our goal is to make this process as easy as possible for you. If you have questions about our directions, reach out to us.

Here are complete directions. Please follow our instructions and do not make up your own.

Wash

Generally, wash your quilt in a washing machine in cold water. If the quilt is large... queen size or larger... we recommend washing it in a front loading machine or at a laundry mat in a large front loading machine.

We have found the quilts to be durable. We have one that was washed just about every weekend for the past 5 years and it is still in awesome condition!

Dry

Dry in a dryer like you would dry your clothes. You can also line dry it, but it may be a little crunchy as all line dried clothes tend to be.

Click here for complete care information. 

One way I know of is to vacuum the quilt top. This will remove dust and the like. It won't remove stains or freshen the quilt. 

If the fabrics used to make the quilt will either shrink or bleed if washed, it would then have to be dry-cleaned.

If a company tells you to dry-clean your quilt, it means they did not prewash the material on the back of the quilt. 

Forever, I hope. Okay, I know nothing lasts forever. So then, I hope your quilt lasts a number of generations.

How long a T-shirt quilt lasts depends on a number of factors. Here's an article that goes into those factors in detail.

Your quilt will be long-armed machine quilted. Each block on the front side will be quilted in a unique pattern. These patterns may or may not line up with the block on the back of the quilt

Unlike our single-sided quilts, none of the images on the T-shirts will be traced. Read more about how we quilt our regular quilts here.

We suggest sticking to T-shirts, sweatshirts and fabric. 

3D items such as bows, stuffed animals, varsity letters, patches and anything else that is not flat will not be added to the double-sided quilt.

We do not make double-sided baby clothes quilts.

The front and the back of your quilt have to be and will be the same size.

There are a number of different ways you can divide up your T-shirts.

• You would send us one grouping of T-shirts and we would divide the T-shirts between the front and back based on content and color.
• You can divide your T-shirts into two separate bags – one for the front and one for the back.
• If the groupings end up different sizes, you have the following options –
  1. You will need to be willing to move T-shirts from one side to the other to balance the size. You need to have these shirt(s) determined ahead of time so you can tell us which ones to move without us having to go through each block with you.
     
  2. You will need to have a bag of extra T-shirts that can be used to balance out the smaller side with the larger side.
  3. You can have us add blank blocks of T-shirt material to the small side to increase its size to be equal with the other side.

• You can send us T-shirts and have us use the fronts on the front and backs on the back of the quilt. This method will most likely result in the front and back of the quilt being different sizes. This means you will need to have a plan to balance out the two sides. See a, b and c above for options.

We can put the fronts of your T-shirts on the front of your quilt and the backs on the back.

We will not attempt to match up every front to it’s back so they are front to back on the quilt.  This is because the fronts and backs of T-shirts are rarely the same size and matching becomes unmanageable. 

Unfortunately, no. Stained-glass and regular quilts use different block sizes. Once T-shirts are cut for the stained-glass style, the change can't be undone.

We will help you with this. We will give you a broad idea of what colors could be chosen. Then we will narrow that down and show you the final options. 

Black is not always the right color to choose. Here's a quilt with teal blue leading.

Typically 6 to 10 weeks.

Thought, it will depend on the time of year. Around Christmas and during high school graduation season, it may be closer to 8 to 12 weeks. In January and in August it could be closer to 5 weeks. If it will be longer than 10 weeks, we will let you know. 

If you have a specific date that you need to have your quilt returned by, please indicate this on your order form so we can plan accordingly. 

Note: The turn around time clock begins upon your approval of the size of your quilt. We try to email you size and border options within 2-4 days of receiving your box. We do not start counting time until we hear back from you approving your quilts size. The time does not begin when you ship out your T-shirts.  Please note this in your time frame.

This is a very rough estimate.The number of items needed will depends on how much we use from any one item. The more we use from each item, the fewer items you will need.

For example, we might use a larger block from a blanket than we would from a onesie with a small design on the front.

Most people will send us what belongs in the quilt and tell us what size they are hoping to get. We will work with you to make the quilt the size you would like with what you have sent to us. 

But don't send us 100 items and expect to have a lap size quilt made. 

A Too Cool Style Baby Clothes Quilt

A spectacular T-shirt quilt made from your from your baby's clothing. All the blocks will be different sizes and it will be puzzled together. 

Quilt Binding Your Choice of Color

All Too Cool T-shirt Quilts come with a binding. 

The binding is the material that goes around the outside of the quilt. About ¼" of the binding is seen from the top, the side and the back of a quilt. The binding is used to hide the raw edges of the quilt top, batting and backing materials. 

Our Spectacular Individualized Quilting

The quilting designs on the back of a Too Cool T-shirt quilt are not only fun, they are one of the things that set a Too Cool T-shirt quilt apart from other T-shirt quilts. 

Return Shipping

Return shipping is included in the price of a quilt. There are two exceptions... 

1. Additional shipping charges for Alaska, Hawaii and International orders.
2. Return of Scraps or a lot of extra unused T-shirts. 

We can use just about anything that is soft and washable. Here are some items you might not think of using.

Baby shoes

Look for ones with soft soles. The rubber-soled shoes are not useable.

Stuffed toys 

We remove the stuffing and flatten it out.

Blankets and bedding 

This can include blankets, sheets and crib bumpers.

Socks, booties and hats

Each of these are great items to put into a quilt.

Special bibs

You can use bibs in the quilt. Look for the special ones and the ones that are less stained (unless the stains are important).

Some items can be used whole like dresses and some we can use just a piece from. If there are particular items you would like to use the whole, please label those items.

Here's a list of some of the items you can use:

• Bibs
• Socks
• Baby slipper
• Overalls with shirt underneath
• Baby blankets
• Onesies
• Dresses
• Ruffle-butt tights
• Headband
• Baby shoe
• Stuffed animals
• Bloomers
• Whole and parts of dresses

Backing colors - we have over 350 colors to choose from.

If you want something beyond a standard generally accepted colors, please send a swatch. For example navy, hunter green, red, orange, etc. are colors that are what they are.

But a color like teal or sage - there is more than one interpretation to these colors. So if you would send a swatch of color that would be helpful. You can get a swatch from a paint chip, from one of your T-shirts, a color crayon scribble on a piece of white paper or out of a magazine (circle the color).

Yes you can. Minky is a specific type of material that is thicker and furry.

Our Austin Texas location works with this material. If you are interested in this material for the back of your quilt, please read more about Minky backing here.

You can mix and match any fabrics in a memorial quilt.

1. T-shirts, Sweatshirts, Jerseys, Tank Tops
2. Dress Shirts, Work Shirts, Polo Shirts
3. Blankets, Quilts
4. Sweatpants, running shorts
5. Blue Jeans  
6. Slacks
7. Logos from Baseball Caps
8. Bathrobes
9. Coats, Gloves, Hats
10. Neckties
11. Photographs transferred onto fabric. Read more here.

The one important thing to remember is that when you mix and match fabrics, you must follow the cleaning directions of the most delicate fabric. So, if all the items in your quilt are machine wash, tumble dry, that is how you would care for the quilt. But, if one item were machine wash, line dry, then you would have to care for the quilt in that manner.

This is most important when you mix dry-clean only items with regular wash and dry clothing. If there is one clothing item that is dry-clean only, then your quilt needs to be dry-cleaned.

I knew you were going to ask that question. I don't have a set answer such as 32 or 15. How many items you need depends on how many items you have and how you want to use those items. 

• Larger quilts need more and can accommodate more items.
• Smaller quilts need fewer items and can be made with fewer items.

I would suggest beginning with our how many T-shirts chart here. This can give you an idea of how many clothing items you might need.

But clothing is different than T-shirts because we can cut multiple pieces from each clothing item. 

For example, most of the quilts we made for this family were each made from 6 to 9 clothing items. In the photo here you can see that we used 4 to 5 pieces from each item. 

• The fewer items you have, the more and the larger blocks we will cut from each item.
• The more items you have, the less we will cut from each piece. And if you have a lot of items, we will cut smaller pieces from each item. 

For large lap size quilts like these, I would suggest no fewer than 6 item and no more 25 items. But the system is flexible. 

If you only want one block cut from each item, then I would suggest you send closer to the top number for the size you want in the chart above. 

Typically 4 to 6 weeks.

Thought, it will depend on the time of year. Around Christmas and during high school graduation season, it may be closer to 6 to 8 weeks. In January and in August it could be closer to 3 weeks. If it will be longer than 6 weeks, we will let you know. 

If you have a specific date that you need to have your quilt returned by, please indicate this on your order form so we can plan accordingly. 

Note: The turn around time clock begins upon your approval of the size of your quilt. We try to email you size and border options within 2-4 days of receiving your box. We do not start counting time until we hear back from you approving your quilts size. The time does not begin when you ship out your T-shirts.  Please note this in your time frame.

1 to 10 T-shirts. 

We can make a pillow from a single T-shirt. These are very cool!

If you want a number of T-shirts used, stack them in order of importance. We will use the T-shirts in order until the pillow is complete.

Clothing/Memorial Pillows

Choose 4 to 8 clothing items for this style pillow.

A Too Cool Style T-shirt Pillow

A spectacular T-shirt pillow made from your T-shirts.  All the blocks will be different sizes and it will be puzzled together. 

Pillow Form

Your pillow comes complete with a pillow form. This can be removed for washing.

Our Spectacular Individualized Quilting

Your pillow will be completely quilts like our quilt. 

Return Shipping

Return shipping is included in the price of a quilt. There are two exceptions... 

1. Additional shipping charges for Alaska, Hawaii and International orders.
2. Return of Scraps or a lot of extra unused T-shirts. 

Yes, we can use sweatshirts. Once they are in your pillow, it's difficult to tell them apart from T-shirts.

We also can use jersey material - the knit material with holes in it that is used in some football and hockey jerseys. Read more about what you can use here.

No. There are any number of items that can be used in a T-shirt pillow. We can use most items that are machine washable. 

And since this is a pillow - make sure you are ok resting your face on the item!

Read more about what we can use in your T-shirt pillow here.

Some work better than others, but here is a list of some of the things that we have used...

Just about any part! Front, back, sleeves and even the neck line. We can use a front and a back from the same T-shirt. We also can use the legs or the butt from pants or shorts. So you are not limited!

We will use every part of your T-shirt unless it is "X"-ed out with blue painters masking tape. You are welcome to put notes on your T-shirts if you have a special request. Please write these notes on blue painters masking tape. This way the note can stay attached to the T-shirt until we have the quilt top sewn together.

We have found that paper notes that are pinned or stapled on leave holes in the T-shirts and are difficult to work with when we are cutting and sewing.

Read more about marking what you don't want used here.