Thursday 19 January 2012

Block Conundrum

Ooooh, I HAVE been away a while! I have done practially no sewing at all since New Year (unless you imclude fixing the hanging hook on my coat!) but I have had great intentions to start on my next quilt.

Last night I found the pattern I had saved for my Curio quilt and was ready to start slicing fabric, but I'm just not keen on it any more. After much research, I decided that Curio looks best in really detailed quilts and I found one that I think I will end up copying, but I am not quite sure how to do it.

My inspiration is here at Bellet Blog and the following picture is her own quilt.


I love the concentric circle spiderweb with a string pieced diamond shape between. It looks like a mixture between a Spiderweb and a Rocky Road to Kansas quilt. But the bit I can't figure out is how to draw the pattern pieces.

I have been researching Spiderweb blocks and the best I have found is at A La Mode which was sent to me by Kris, but the problem I have is that at this step;

(photograph from A La Mode's tutorial)

I need to split it into 3 seperate blocks (the left and right hand triangles would form segments of 2 spiderwebs and the central kite would be a quarter of a rocky road) so that I can make strings for each segment.

but what do I do about seam allowances? The tutorial has already accounted for seam allowances around the outside of the complete triangle (I presume) so do I just add 1/4inch along each side of the 2 blue lines for each of the pieces?

Advice needed as I think I fried my brain trying to do this last night and I really want to get started!

J x

EDIT: thank you Laura, my package arrived last night and it looks perfect. I can't wait to get started now! X

3 comments:

  1. Jen,

    (cross posted from flickr)

    I'm fairly sure this block would be foundation paper pieced straight onto the paper. So as long as you can draw the initial triangle with the two lines separating each "web" section with a "cross" section, you should be fine. I.E. The blocks are one big triangle, so you dont need seam allowances.

    I believe this is a variation on the maple leaf rag quilt from material obsession 2. The variation is that the strips in the "cross" part are all the same width, rather than crazy scrappy.

    If you wanna borrow the book I'll happily drop it round for you?

    Lx

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  2. Hi Jen, I used A la Mode's pattern but didn't paper piece it. I made 2 templates, 1 cut out the centre bit and used it as a template to give me the centre, and I also made a template of the whole section. Then I simply sewed string scraps down both sides of the centre piece of fabric, wider than I'd need, and then place the whole template on top and cut it out. Because she has allowed seam allowances in the templates it worked out fine. Good luck, Jxo

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  3. Listen to Lolly - I am just about to run away very scared!

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