Quilter's Academy Vol. 1 - Freshman Year: A Skill-Building Course in Quiltmaking by Harriet Hargrave

Author:Harriet Hargrave [Hargrave, Harriet]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Crafts, Hobbies, Non-Fiction, Quilting, Sewing
ISBN: 9781571205940
Amazon: 1571205942
Publisher: C&T Publishing
Published: 2009-10-15T23:00:00+00:00

Country Lanes blocks laid out square for quilt

By now, you have the basic idea of how to get a picture of a quilt you like transferred onto graph paper. By looking at the elements of the quilt, you can assign a grid size to them to get the size quilt you want to make. The nice thing about working on 4- or 8-to-the-inch graph paper is that you can simply assign each of those squares a grid size, regardless of the grid of the graph paper.

Go back to the drawing you did of either Harriet’s or Carrie’s quilt in Exercise: Drawing a simple quilt (page 51), and let’s play around with grid sizes. We are going to start big, so let’s assign each square of the graph paper a size of 2″. This should be easy for you to work out.

If each graph paper square equals 2″, and each block is 3 squares by 3 squares, then 2″ × 3 = 6″ (this is the finished size of the blocks for your quilt). Now look on a ruler. Does 2″ seem a little chunky to you? Well, let’s try 1½″. Do the same math: 1½″ × 3 = 4½″. Does that seem a little nicer? How about a little smaller yet—let’s try 1¼″. That’s 1¼″ × 3 = 3¾″. Play with the math to your heart’s content.

For Cowboy Corral, Carrie did not pick the size of her blocks first. The pictures in the fabric she chose for the solid squares dictated the size those blocks needed to be, and then she sized the Fence Post blocks to fit. In that fabric, the motif squares measured 3½″ × 3½″. She calculated 3½″ ÷ 3 = 1.16″, but that was not a quilter-friendly number. By using a square ruler, you can size up the square to be divisible by three. With Cowboy Corral, the solid blocks were cut 5″ so that the finished size would be 4½″. This is a special case. If you look at Interlacing Circles, you will notice that again there are large solid squares, but this time you are able to determine the size you want your Nine-Patch and Fence Post blocks to be and then simply cut the fabric you are using for the solid squares to the size you need.

All right! You have the basics of drafting! Not too hard, was it? In Class 170, you will start the process of figuring yardage, so keep your drawings and set them aside to use as worksheets when you get there.

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