Showcase your beautiful fabrics in this quick Easy Weave Quilt! The best part is even if your seams don't match, your quilt will still look amazing. Learn how to make it in this new quilting tutorial:
Easy Weave Quilt
Finished Size: 60 x 72 inches
Click here to download this free quilt pattern
Piecing Tips and Tricks for the Easy Weave Quilt
The Easy Weave Quilt is created entirely with strip piecing. This is a method of piecing long strips together to create a strip set.
Piecing a strip set is much faster than cutting and piecing each block individually because you don't have to stop and start so much. With this method you can piece two long seams to create a strip set and cut out three quilt blocks. If you pieced this individually, you would have to cut out the shapes exactly first, then sew six short seams, breaking thread with each seam.
As you can see, strip piecing speeds up the process and makes cutting much faster too! It was the perfect technique to use with the long strips of fabric I had for this project.
Yes, Batik Fabrics Can Bleed
Because the fabrics were already cut down into narrow 4 1/2 inch and 8 1/2 inch strips, I wasn't able to wash them before piecing them into my quilt. If I had, the narrowest strips would probably have turned out very frayed and distorted and been very hard to cut down into a useable shape.
Batik fabrics in particular are prone to bleeding and the dyes can leak onto other fabrics. This is why I choose black as my background for the Easy Weave Quilt. Even if these beautiful blue and purple batiks bleed, the black fabric will hide it completely.
Arranging the Woven Blocks
For 2018 my goal is to create a lot more throw sized quilts that can also fit nicely on my kitchen table. I only have so many couches and beds that need a quilt, and I love the idea of using quilts as a tablecloth. So to make sure my quilt ended up the right size, I arranged all the blocks on the table like this:
It was a bit challenging to get the weave arranged just right, especially with the blocks sliding off the edges of the table. But I was able to figure out I only needed to make the quilt 5 blocks wide. With that knowledge on hand, I moved the arrangement to a bigger table to double check that I had a nicely woven pattern created.
Just double check that the same fabric runs in every-other block vertically or horizontally. That's what creates the woven effect!
Don't Sweat Matched Seams
For this quilt, you really don't need to worry about the seams of your blocks matching. Why? Because the colorful fabrics are all surrounded by background fabric and the places where the blocks join is just background. The seams joining the blocks together should just disappear into the background so even if your piecing isn't perfect, this quilt is still going to turn out great!
When piecing, I put my Free Motion Glider in front of my machine so the pieces slip easily under the foot. It makes piecing the quilt much faster and reduces the chance the seam allowances will flip over. When I'm not piecing, I use this same tool to reduce the friction between my machine and quilt so it's easier and faster to move my quilt. How's that for a multitasker!
Easy Weave is the perfect size for Gift Quilts
Check out these beautiful Easy Weave quilts created by quilters from the Evangelical Covenant Church in Princeton, IL!
Mary W contacted me about using this pattern to create multiple gift quilts for her church's graduating class. Each year quilters from the church make quilts for each of the high school seniors to wrap them in love and faith as they step into adulthood.
Mary shared this with us:
"And that is exactly what we tell our youth, that we are wrapping them with love and prayers as they go on from high school, to remind them of their faith and of our congregation that loves and supports them. We have our youth pastor select a Bible verse(s) each year for them and I put it on each quilt label.
Thank you for letting me share your pattern with our Quilters. It was simple yet pretty to make which is what we aim for. I made 2 of them. For one of our Quilters this was only the 2nd quilt she had made. And she also made 2 quilts for the seniors! Hopefully our picture will encourage others to try all kinds of color ways for your pattern. I would definitely make this pattern again, and I don't often say that."
Thank you so much for sharing this with us, Mary!
If you have a quilting group and would like to use this Easy Weave pattern multiple times, please feel free to do so. You are welcome to print and share this pattern as much as you like!
More Woven Quilt Patterns!
Did you know I've created two other woven quilt patterns? I think these quilts are a great way to showcase beautiful fabrics in a very simple, elegant way. Click the links below to find free quilt patterns for the other woven quilts I've designed:
 |
 |
