I'm still pretty new to sewing, when buying fabric for cushions and/or curtains is there anything I need to look out for. Are some fabric made better than others, and how can I tell if it's a 'bad' or poor quality fabric (if that's a thing!). What do I need to look out for and potentially avoid.

Thanks!

I feel like I'm flooding this forum with my upholstery/soft furnishing related questions

So I've finally got hold of/gifted some fabric by the metre to play with. It's 140cm wide in a 5metre roll at the moment and I'm wondering how you guys store your fabric like this (especially as you get more)? I'm guessing it's sold in a roll to stop any creases and for ease as it comes off a bigger roll, but I really don't have space for something that long ideally!

Is there a better way that I can store it, even if it was just halved to 70cm it would be a lot easier, but I don't want to make life harder for myself if folding and putting creases into the fabric will make more work for me in the future.

So my question... if I unroll it and fold it into a smaller size, do I need to watch out for creases or anything that will make more work in future? Are there any good techniques/ideas I should know about to make storing fabrics easier? Maybe a way I can stack them rather than store it in a roll?

I assume when you buy fabric online it doesn't get shipped in a long roll like this, so there must be a way to fold it nicely?

Thanks as always for your help and advice

I've been to look at a few machines yesterday and I'm assuming the 'side to side' setting @Bill is referring to is so you can adjust the needle to be as close or as far away as you want it compared to the piping foot? From what I could see the piping foot just holds it in place but there's no way of sewing at a specific point relative to the foot without that 'side to side' functionality. (I'm sure there's a better term for that! ). I also could be completely wrong, but the Bernina I tried let you adjust that.

Thanks for all the replies too, gives me lots to google and look into. 

Thanks everyone. Maybe I've just imagined it then, I'm sure I'd seen an article on 'top 10 left handed sewing machines' or similar and just presumed it was a thing! I've got a lot to learn I think! I'm starting completely from scratch but I'm looking forward to the challenge.

I look forward to reading through the forum. Plenty more newbie questions to come