Saturday, December 07, 2019

Stepping Up Tutorial

Wow,  the response to my "Stepping Up" quilt was fantastic. I think it was seen over a thousand times counting this blog and Facebook.  The interesting thing is how well it hides the construction method.  I received so many questions.  If I were a pattern writer, I would certainly write up and publish a pattern. Lucky you,  I will just show you in this post how it is constructed. 

First let's look at the quilt again.
I promise you that it is so much easier than it looks.  Let's see how I made it.

First I pulled out fabrics and the die to make it. In fairness, I used the Qube 8" companion set angles in the original quilt.  For the demo, I am using a single die, Triangle in a square.  I think it is smaller.
This is an older single color foam die.  I marked the shapes with a marker.
Then I started cutting fabric in strips. For this size die, I cut the strips 4.25" wide.  Then I cut a colored fabric on the big triangles and a gray on the side triangles.

I repeated that step with another color and black instead of gray.
If you are using a print fabric you will need to be sure to cut the gray face up and the black face down (or vice versa) so that you have both angle directions to complete the block. Since I am using batiks, I didn't have to worry about that.

I then made a single unit.
It is important that you consistently place the black on one side and the gray on the other the same every time. This makes the layout work. 

Then on a design wall or on a table (or even the floor) - lay your design out and look at it. In this demo mine are not sewn, but you can, and probably should,  sew all the units before you lay them out.

The reason I didn't sew these first is so that you  can see the individual pieces.  You may notice that this is NOT the exact layout for my quilt.  I only cut a few pieces to take photos for this demo.  I realized that the layout was different after I was already writing the post. (Bad me, I did not redo the photo.)

So what will I do with these pieces?  I am going to make a companion pillow for my quilt.  A special thanks to Island Batik for providing me with these fabrics as an Island Batik Ambassador.  I am sure I will eventually use every scrap possible.


Until Next Time,  
Stay Creative 


Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

7 comments:

Karen said...

A clever piecing technique, Gene. Thanks for explaining your method.

Linda Swanekamp said...

Isn't it magic when a simple construction and cutting yields such a complex design? Thanks for sharing!

A Left-Handed Quilter said...

Thanks for the demo of your method! I think that you SHOULD write patterns - your explanation was "clear, concrete, and concise" as one of my college professors would say - and MUCH better than some other "patterns" that I have seen - ;))

Turid said...

Thank you Gene, I really love this quilt. Maybe I should try?

Quilting Tangent said...

A nice twist on the baby blocks pattern, never saw one that looked like stairs. Great Job!

Vicki in MN said...

You make it look so easy! Thanks for the tutorial.

Quilting Gail said...

Ingenious!!!
When you told me that you used tri-rec rulers - it didn't make sense! Now it does.
Thanks for the tutorial, you creative, talented man!
Happy Quilting! :-)
quiltinggail@yahoo.ca