What kind of laser should I get to cut fabric?
I built a home made CO2 laser that would work. It's only 40 Watts but it can cut through thin plywood, luon, basla, and fabric as well.It can also score granite marble etc.  I had an old pair of jeans I cut the legs off with the laser to make a pair of shorts. It worked ok, but this is before I had a XY table so I had to move the jeans by hand. (dangerous!) The trick is to focus the beam to a very small spot. At that point its soo hot (>3000 F) that the fabric just vaporizes and there is no chance for it to singe or catch on fire especially if the beam is traveling. I am just finishing an XY table with a flying beam design to go with the laser. It's controlled by a AVR microcontoller that talks to a PC through a serial port, and will interpret standard "NC G-Codes". Then I can play with cutting patterns in all sorts of things. A YAG laser might work too and there is a lot less plumbing. If your intrested go to sams laser faq http://repairfaq.org/sam/lasersam.htm and you will find more information about building fixing using lasers than you ever tought. Also you can post to ALT.LASERS Just BE CAREFUL if you want to do this, lasers and their equipment can put a real hurting on you.
And remember "Don't stare into the beam with the remaining eye!"