Class, One Block Wonder with Kelley Richardson

2 sessions – Saturday July 16, August 6, 10am – 4pm

This is your chance to make a quilt that is uniquely yours.  The One Block Wonder Quilt uses repeats in fabric to make a kaleidoscope style blocks that are joined together.  Then they are trimmed and a border is added.

Notes for the class:

One Block Wonder Class

First and foremost, DO NOT PRE-WASH THE FABRIC!!!!It is much much easier to work with if it is not pre washed…BUT if you have to pre wash it because of the possibility of the colour running then once it is washed press it really well with a product like Best Press to put some body back into the fabric.

Fabric Considerations: The best fabrics for this process are large prints with little background, especially flowers or animals. The rule of thumb is once the repeats are aligned, we will be cutting them in approx. 3 ¾” strips if the design elements in your fabric are smaller than 4” you will not be taking the design apart and your blocks will look like the original fabric Therefore choose Medium to large prints.

Fabric Required: The Formula for the amount of fabric required is 6 repeats of fabric for the blocks. So if you have a 24” repeat you would multiply 6 X 24 which = 144”, divided by 36” = 4 yards or 3.69 meters for the blocks (but buy 4 ¼ yards or 4 meters to be safe). If you are going to use the original fabric in the borders buy at least 6 Meters. This will give you approx. a twin with borders, if you want a larger quilt get more fabric just remember you need six repeats so if your repeat is 24” you need an additional 4 yards to make your quilt bigger. If you are using a panel you will need 6 identical panels.

Note do not be afraid of a 12” repeat but in that case you need to purchase 12 repeats unless you are making a baby quilt.

To find the repeat, lay the fabric in front of you with the fold line near you. Find a design element which is easily identifiable near the fold, when it comes up again you have found the repeat.

DO NOT PRE-WASH THE FABRIC!!!! —have I mentioned this enough yet do not prewash the fabric unless you must.

Basic Supplies:

• Rotary Cutting tools: a rotary cutter with a new blade
• Rulers: one 6” x 24” long, and one 6” x 12” with a 60 degree line on the ruler OR a 60 degree triangle ruler. (I do prefer to use the 60 degree triangle ruler it does make it much easier to accurately cut the fabric)
• Rotary cutting mat: you will need a 36” mat or larger as we will be cutting fabric strips the Width of the Fabric (WOF)
• Flower Head Pins. These pins lay flat; flat enough for a ruler to be over them and the ruler will still be flat against the fabric…you need quite a few of these
• Basic sewing supplies: neutral piecing thread, ¼” foot, Scissors, seam ripper, etc.
• Sewing Machine in good working order.
• Small Safety pins for keeping cut hexagons together when taking them home and to pin together both halves of the hexagon when placing on the design wall. I use small light weight safety pins. For a quilt using a 24” repeat you will need 100 to 120 small safety pins.

I also suggest bringing an old sheet to pin your blocks on when you lay out the pattern, part of the fun is moving the blocks around to create different looks for your quilt and once you have done this you will want to keep the blocks in place for sewing the rows together.

We will be doing all of the cutting in class so there is no prep other than buying your fabric for this class.

Please refrain from wearing perfumed products during class.