Making Up Your Quilt Top

Liberty Stars Quilt-along |Hexagon Layout | Hexagon Block Instructions | My Blocks | Liberty Stars Quilt-along Flickr Group

For those of you who are not making up as large a quilt as I am, or have zoomed on, you may have finished making up all the hexagon blocks you need. So that you can go ahead, and not have to wait for me to finish all 56 full + 8 half blocks, I’m putting up the templates for the large triangle pieces you’ll need for joining up your hexagon blocks to make your quilt top.

Sewing instruction images, however, will not go up until I am up to that stage. Need to have something to take pictures of, know what I mean?

FABRIC REQUIREMENTS

Large triangles between hexagon blocks (see aqua colour in this diagram):

44/45″ (112/115cm): 1½ yds (1.3 m)
54″ (135/137 cm): 1¼ yds (1.2m)

2½” (6 cm) border (see aqua colour in the image below):

44/45″ (112/115cm): 1 yds (0.8 m)
54″ (135/137 cm): ¾ yds (0.6 m)

TEMPLATES

If you have made all 56 hexagon blocks, then cut the following:

Using solid colour fabric:

104 x full large triangles
16 x half large triangles

(If you are making a smaller quilt, then count out the number of full and half large triangles you’ll need using this quilt top layout image as a guide.)

Click to download the pattern templates:

Here are my triangles. I cut them by folding my fabric over and over till I have 4 thicknesses, then I cut 5¾” strips across the fabric, and finally cut out the triangles by placing my template on the fabric and cutting diagonal lines around it, remembering to leave at least a ¼” seam allowance around the template. Also important is that you make sure you’ve cut half of the half-triangles facing one direction, and then turning the template over and cutting the other half facing the other direction. That way, you’ll have half-triangles for both the right and the left sides of your quilt top.

SEWING INSTRUCTIONS

Once you have cut your large triangles (104 full, 16 half), construct your rows as follows.

ROW 1

Important:
Since your full triangles are NOT equal-sided, you’ll need to identify the “bottom” side, ie. the shortest side, and always sew that side onto your hexagon.

Starting from the left side of the top row, take two half triangles and sew them to the left side of your hexagon block. Then take a large triangle and sew it onto the top right side.

Now, make up 5 “middle” pieces, like this:

Now make up the last piece for the end of your first row like this:

Next, join all the above pieces to make up your top row, like this:

ROW 2

Create your second row in the same way as the first, but begin like this:

And end your row like this:

Your second row should be constructed like this:

Continue on until you have created eight rows altogether – 4 x Row 1, and 4 x Row 2. Now, join your rows together, like so:

BORDER

Our next step is to add our border. I’ll post instructions for this in a few weeks, once all the rows are completed.

QUESTIONS

If you have any questions or comments about any of the steps above, or anything related to this part of the process, please write a comment.

Please remember to upload images of your progress to our Flickr Group!