I have been in love with the illusion of the
Stacked Squares quilt pattern for awhile now, and I've finally gotten around to making my very own.
Although I have loved the pattern, it is written using a layer cake and two jelly rolls. I don't know why, but that seemed like a lot of fabric for a throw sized quilt. Using precuts is certainly easy, and patterns for them are often written to judiciously use up every bit of fabric, but not always. Since this pattern only uses 23 of the layer cake squares, and of course, since I didn't have a layer cake and two jelly rolls of a single fabric line on hand, I decided to make some modifications to the pattern to make it work for my stash.
I have had a FQ bundle of Garden Party Tango (with a few other fabrics from stash) that was just begging to be used in this pattern, but figuring out how to make it work was a challenge. The biggest difference in my Stacked Squares quilt and the Moda Bakeshop pattern is that my center squares are only 8 inches finished, making my finished blocks 16 inches. This makes it possible to make the quilt from 23 fat quarters (or quarter yards) and I don't think it detracts from the illusion of the pattern at all.
If you'd like to make a Stacked Squares from FQ's or quarter yards, here's how I did it-
Choose 23 coordinating fat quarters or quarter yards. From each print, cut-
1- 8.5" square
2- 2.5" x 8.5" strips (for the inner border around the square)
4- 2.5" x 12.5" strips (two of these will be for the inner border, and two for the outer border)
2- 2.5" x 16.5" strips (for the outer border)
for FQ cutting (18 x 21")- *diagram not to scale
or if you are using quarter yards (9 x 42.5")- *diagram not to scale
**Make sure you have enough width in your fabric. Some bolts are a little shorter, but I have used plenty that are wide enough.
You are cutting one complete block from each fabric. So, after you mix up the fabrics in a way that is pleasing to you, you will have 23 complete blocks, each with three contrasting fabrics. Even though the quilt technically only has 20 blocks, you will need all 23 to make all of the "partial" squares work.
My finished quilt top measures 64" x 80" (a twin size!) which is actually a little bigger than the Moda Bakeshop pattern. Pretty cool, considering that I downsized the center squares! Let me know if you decide to try this pattern out with these measurements with your own stash!
