Giant Vintage Star Quilt Tutorial

Giant Vintage Star Quilt Tutorial, a photo by jenib320 on Flickr.

As promised, a tutorial for my Giant Vintage Star Quilt! This quilt takes advantage of a single quilt block, blown up huge! It takes a traditional block, the Starflower block, and makes for a very modern quilt! Perfect for new and seasoned quilters alike!  For more on my process and inspiration, see here!

First, you need to decide what kind of color layout you'd like! You may choose to use as few as two colors or as many as eight. You could also use as few as two fabrics or as many as sixteen! I've drawn out a few options here as examples:


This is the layout I used, 8 different colors using 16 different fabrics.


A little less busy, 4 different colors.


And finally, just two colors.

Giant Vintage Star Quilt, a photo by jenib320 on Flickr.

However many colors you decide on, you also need to decide on how many fabrics to use. The traditional starflower block uses a single fabric for each 'petal'. In my quilt I used one color in each petal but two different fabrics. You may choose to do whatever you'd like for your quilt!

Materials
8-16 fat quarters
2 yards of background fabric
4 yards of batting (72"x72")
Twin bedsheet or 4 yards of backing fabric (72"x72")
1/2 yard of binding fabric

Seam Allowance: 1/4"
Finished Quilt Size: 68"x68"

Cutting Instructions
From each print cut: (1) 18" square
From background fabric cut: (4) 18" squares, (4) 17.5" squares

Giant Vintage Star Quilt, a photo by jenib320 on Flickr.

1. First, you want to decide how much variety you want and what kind of color scheme you'd like. That will determine how much fabric you need and how you'll construct your quilt. If you don't mind prints repeating in your quilt, you can use 8 fat quarters. If you don't want any repeats and want more variety like mine, you need 16 fat quarters, but you'll only be using half of each fat quarter.


2. Think about how you want to lay out your colors. This will determine which prints you pair up together. I've included this blank quilt diagram that you can print and color in your layout if you'd like!

3a. If you're using 4 or 2 colors AND 8 fat quarters, you'll be constructing your blocks using the traditional half-square triangle (HST) method. You need a total of 8 print/background HSTs and 4 print/print HSTs. So, create 2 pairs of print squares, and 4 pairs of print/background squares. You can use my Half-Square Triangle Tutorial if you need help with that!

3b. If you're using 8 colors OR 16 fat quarters, you'll be putting together your half-square triangles a different way. You need to cut your 16 print squares and four 18" background squares in half across the diagonal. You'll end up with a total of 32 print triangles and 8 background triangles. Take half of your print triangles and set them aside for another project, you won't be needing them to create this quilt top. Now, pair up 8 print triangles with your 8 background triangles. Take the remaining 8 print triangles and pair them up with each other. Sew each pair of triangles to create 12 half-square triangles.

*To make that diagonal cut, I temporarily taped two 24" rulers end to end!

4. Once your half-square triangles are finished and pressed, they may need trimming down to 17.5"


5. Lay out your blocks, arranging your blocks like the diagram above to create the starflower petal shapes. Piece together and press your blocks towards the darker fabric.

Giant Vintage Star Quilt, a photo by jenib320 on Flickr.

Now baste, quilt, and bind! You can reference my basting & quilting tutorial and my binding tutorial if you need to!

Giant Vintage Star Quilt, a photo by jenib320 on Flickr.

Voila! You're done! Creating other designs in giant form is easy when you're using fat quarters. Simply find a block pattern you like, and make your starting squares 18"! I'm going to use my left over triangles to make a companion quilt, perhaps in a windmill pattern!

I am going to try and work on kits, but I'm not sure how many I will be able to create, as they require a large amount of a background sheet (which I don't usually buy many of) and an entire twin sheet for the backing. However, you could purchase vintage sheet fat quarters and use a regular solid for the background!

Hopefully that all makes sense! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns!