You have probably heard of Liberty Fabrics and may be wondering what are they and why do people love them so much? Our Liberty Fabric guide will tell you all you need to know about these iconic British Fabrics.
What are Liberty Fabrics?
Founded by Arthur Lasenby Liberty in 1875 Liberty London was established with the intention of bringing luxurious fabrics, ornaments and objets d’art to the British people. As a son of a draper, Arthur was able to create a strong fabric brand known for it’s bold use of colour, advent-garde textiles and popular floral designs.
The colourful prints are printed onto high quality fabric bases, ensuring the vibrant colours are long lasting. Liberty fabrics are used for dressmaking, quilting, accessories and soft furnishings. Many of their designs are timeless, still being used decades after their original print runs. They keep an archive of their 45,000+ designs, which they delve into to re-colour or rescale prints for new releases.
Not only are Liberty well know for their feminine ditsy floral prints, but they release annual Christmas collections, art deco style geometrics, adorable animal prints and in recent years they have introduced collections designed specifically for quilters.
As well as being able to buy Liberty fabrics from their flagship Tudor style London store there are a few web stockists, including our website sponsors Sewbox – an authorised retailer of Liberty fabrics. Below we talk you through the different types of Liberty Fabrics, along with their suggested uses and illustrated with fabrics available at Sewbox.
TIP – Make sure you join the Sewbox newsletter (bottom left of their homepage) for some great offers and giveaways.
DISCOUNT: Sewbox are offering 10% off all web orders with code: SEWBOX
Tana Lawn Fabric
Liberty is best known for their Tana cotton lawn fabrics. This soft and silky fabric has a beautiful drape, making it ideal for dressmaking. It’s also popular in quilts because of its soft feel, and used in accessories like hair bows. It’s a cool and comfortable light to midweight fabric with vibrant prints that don’t fade over time. Some prints are also available as a GOTS certified organic fabric too.
Liberty Lantana
Liberty’s Lantana fabric combines cotton with wool, creating a soft drapey fabric with a little more weight and warmth than their cotton tana lawn. It’s a mid-weight fabric which has a firmer texture than Tana Lawn. It’s great for making dresses, skirts, blouses and trousers. It’s well suited to autumn, winter and spring garments. The lighter weight Tana lawn tends to be more suited to summer garments although it is often used for layering garments in cooler weather
Rossmore Cord
Liberty’s Rossmore corduroy is a fine 100% cotton needlecord. It’s great for structured garments such as jackets and trousers. Its fine weight makes for neat, sharp collars and cuffs on shirts and blouses. Like Liberty’s other fabrics it has a soft, almost velvet-like touch feel to it. I’ve made some soft toys with it because they are durable and snuggly.
We have a baby quilt tutorial here made with Liberty Rossmore Cord.
Liberty Jersey
With a lovely soft feel, and great stretch the Liberty jersey fabrics are ideal for pyjamas, t-shirts, dresses and loungewear. There is an organic jersey fabric available too.
Belgravia Satin Silk
This luxurious lightweight drapey fabric is perfect for blouses, tops and dresses, or to line jackets. Liberty’s Belgravia Satin silk fabrics are famed for their fluidity and high shine surfaces, making their vibrant colours and prints really stand out.
Liberty Quilting Cottons
A little heavier weight than their tana lawn fabrics, these mid weight 100% cotton fabrics are purposely designed to work well for quilting projects, bag making and projects for the home, they can also be used for dressmaking too.
Take a look at our pretty bunting project made with Liberty quilting fabrics or this chevron cushion project.
Southfield Fleece Fabric
This fabric is a soft loop backed sweatshirt fabric, so you can wear your favourite Liberty prints as hoodies, sweatshirts, tracksuit trousers or lounge wear.
Augusta Linen
A more textured and durable fabric Liberty’s Augusta Linen is breathable and cool, perfect for summer garments such as dresses, trousers and shirts. This fabric is a cotton linen blend, and retains the soft touch that Liberty’s fabrics are renowned for.
You’ll find a beautiful selection of all of the above-mentioned Liberty fabrics at Sewbox, alongside modern dressmaking patterns and haberdashery too. Don’t forget you can get 10% off your web order with code: SEWBOX
