1957.5 + 1970

May 18, 2011 at 2:31 pm · Filed under Books, Fabric, Quilts

What a coincidence! I’ve been puttering around with a block I saw while thumbing through Barbara Brackman’s Encylopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns.

I have many old block reference books but only recently added this one to the collection. Clearly an oversight on my part. Clearly.

So, I’ve been puttering with this block working out sizing — the book is a block reference, patterns are not included — and today I arrived at a successful test block.

This is referred to as 1957.5, the Georgia block as published in the periodical Hearth and Home. My version came out to 8″ unfinished. It almost ended up bigger because I couldn’t initially work out the maths involved in sizing that corner square — it is inset into an corner formed by a seam that is pieced at a 45 degree angle. I persevered. Now I am happy with the size.

By coincidence, I said to myself, hey, I’ve been cutting a lot of 2″ squares lately for my One Block Over virtual quilting bee blocks. I wonder if those blocks are the same size as these blocks?

Would you look at that?

Now, the blocks to the right and left of 1957.5 are 1970 (only one page over from 1957.5), a spool block attributed to Nancy Cabot from 1938. This block has gotten the “Badskirt bump” lately. Amy (badskirt) posted a tutorial for the Japanese x and + block after loads of people went gaga over a quilt by Setsuko Inagawa, a picture of which the lovely Jan posted after her visit to the 2011 Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival. I went gaga as well. Happily for me, Amy posted her tutorial just as I was getting ready to send out fabrics for my month of the quilting bee.  There are loads of blocks to see over at the quilt-along Flickr group.

I have a sinking feeling I may need to make two quilts — or maybe three? — one quilt of only 1957.5, one quilt of 1957.5 combined with 1970, and one quilt of 1970.

::sigh::

Whatever the outcome, both blocks are great ones to use up scraps (especially the spool block/1970) and they are Goldilocks-sized — just right. I’m not sure why they seem to perfect at this size but they do. Hmmm, maybe I could even modify the center of the 1957.5 block so it has one rectangle rather than a different fabric square in the middle. Hmmm, I feel more puttering coming on…

Would anyone like a tutorial?

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