#1 Tool to Safely Remove Pet Hair from your Quilts (+ a cautionary tale)

White ragdoll on Cloud Surfing quilt | #1 Tool to Safely Remove Pet Hair from your Quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #quiltingtip

This one’s for you, my fellow fur baby lover!

Our sewing companions sure like to get in on the quilty action, don’t they?!

Pips (my cat!) is forever sniffing, pawing, licking (yes, licking my batting??? Why?), napping and rolling alllllll over my quilts and fabric. He takes his job of quality control very seriously - ha!

But that means, after his “inspection” I’m left with a nice layer of cat hair on my quilts. Blergh.

Sometimes I wonder if this is his sneaky way of trying to claim every single quilt in the house as his own!

Hand with blue medical rubber glove holding a ball of pet fur pulled from a quilt | #1 Tool to safely remove pet hair from quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #quilting 

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#1 BEST TOOL FOR PET HAIR REMOVAL

Over the years, I’ve tried so many different ways to get the hair off. Those *classic red reusable velvet wands (good for small clothing jobs, not big quilts), *reusable sticky roller that you can wash (the total pits), the *disposable sticky roller sheets (these work, but you need A LOT of sheets to get the job done).

Now, I’ll start by saying, Pips’ hair is super fine and sticky – as in, it sticks to EVERYTHING – ugh. So, I needed a tool that would really grab the hair and pull it off the fabric.

Enter *rubber gloves.

Rubbing the pet hair off the Plus Infinity quilt | Best tool to safely remove pet fur from your quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #quilt

Yup, you read that right! The good ol’ standard rubber gloves you use to wash dishes or clean the bathroom is the very best tool to get that pesky hair off your quilts.

The best technique is to just rub your hand over the top of your quilt – like your petting your cat or dog! Seriously, it works!

The process is actually kinda soothing and relaxing. And surprisingly satisfying to see – all – that – hair – come off 😉

By the end of running my hands all over the quilt (front and back) and running my hands along the binding edge (that’s always eye opening to see how much collects there!), I’m usually left with a surprisingly big ball of pet hair. More than I usually expect to get off.

My hand in blue surgical medical gloves holding up cat hair I pulled off my Plus Infinity Quilt | Best tool to safely remove pet fur from your quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #modernquilt

Pictured above is the Plus Infinity quilt, pattern available in the shop.

It also works wonders at getting any batting fuzz off your quilts after you’ve finished quilting and binding them!

I love that a super cheap, easy to find, every day tool can be so helpful in taming those rogue strands of hair.

Last week, before my LIVE #virtualtrunkshow, I spent a good hour cleaning off Pips’ hair from my Plus Infinity quilt (his and my fave to snuggle under). In a pinch, I used these *medical gloves (since I didn’t have a pair of rubber gloves on hand at the cottage), which worked like a charm. I’ve even used these *gardening gloves and *quilting gloves to get the job done, but I find the rubber gloves are the cheapest and most effective.

Up close shot of the Plus Infinity quilt after having the pet hair removed | How to safely remove pet hair from your quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #crossquilt

CAUTIONARY TALE        

This technique is fantastic, and I use it all the time, but there’s one thing you need to be careful about – hand quilting stitches popping out – eeeeeek!

One time, at band camp (HA!, I couldn’t resist!) – one time, when I was rubbing the fur off my Reverberance quilt, I must have pulled too hard in an area with hand stitching and I managed to pop my buried knot back out – cue the tears ☹ You can still pop it back in with a needle, but it’s fiddly and not something I love doing.

So, just be extra careful when rubbing your quilts with the more delicate hand quilting.

White ragdoll (Pips) on the Reverberance quilt - modern log cabin | How to safely remove pet hair from your quilts | Shannon Fraser Designs #logcabinquilt

That’s all there is to it to keep those pesky fur baby hairs at bay!

Have you got a different tool or technique to combat pet hair? Share it in the comments below, so we can all live our best pet hair free quilty lives!!

Happy quilting!

xo

Shannon

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3 comments

  • Interesting … this is not a technique I’ve tried, but I’m willing to give it a shot! Admittedly (and this may horrify you!), I use the attachment on my vacuum to rid my quilts of Golden Retriever hair. I am able to adjust the strength of the suction when I use the attachment, but it’s still pretty strong. All of my quilts are 100% made at my machine (I even bind entirely by machine), and I haven’t had any issues (yet?!) with stitches being pulled out.

    Michelle @ From Bolt to Beauty
  • I can’t wait to try this! Thanks for the tip!!

    Suzy Williams
  • makes trip to Dollar Tree for multiple pairs of rubber gloves

    Seriously, thanks for this! With two cats and two dogs in the house, all they have to do is look at a quilt and there’s hair all over it! 🤪

    Maggie

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