Beyond Basic Borders – Half Square and Quarter Square Triangles Block

Triangle, triangles and more triangles! How can you go wrong! This border is fun and creates great geometric designs which is perfect for your quilt!

Beyond Basic Borders is a new series of how to elevate the quilting border to the next level. Whether you use the leftover fabric from your quilt top, or introduce some new colours, this is going to be fun!

To begin with, we will base the borders on using your GO! Qube Mix & Match sets although we will transition into other dies. Experimenting with colours and layouts, we will show you how simple design changes can alter the appearance of the block.

Finished width size borders:

  • 4” Qube – 2” finished border
  • 6” Qube – 3” finished border
  • 8” Qube – 4” finished border
  • 9” Qube – 4 ½” finished border
  • 10” Qube – 5” finished border
  • 12” Qube – 6” finished border

The length will depend on you quilt top.

Materials:

  1. AccuQuilt GO! Big or GO! Fabric Cutter
  2. Shape 4 from any GO! Mix & Match Qube
  3. Shape 5 from any GO! Mix & Match Qube

Cutting Instructions:

  1. Cut (2) shape 4 – Quarter Square Triangles (QST) per unit
  2. Cut (8) shape 5 – Half Square Triangle (HST) per unit.

Pressing Instructions:

Pressing seams to one side or open is another discussion within itself, although the two general thoughts are:

Open Seamsallow for a smoother flatter quilt top, which doesn’t allow fabric colour to appear through your quilt top.

Side Seam Pressingis faster, and the seam is usually pressed towards the darkest colour. It makes it easier when you want to ‘nest’ seams in place, giving a clean seam intersection.

My suggestion – try both and see what works for you! There are no Quilt Police here

Sewing Instructions:

All seams are ¼” unless otherwise specified.

  1. Sew one light and one medium HST together to create a square. Press.
  2. Sew two light HST onto the square as shown to create a triangle. Press
  3. Sew one light and one dark QST together as shown. Press.
  4. Sew two triangle units together to create a square. Press.

Half-square-and-quarter-square-1

Finished Options:

Adding different colours, in different sequences can totally change the look and appearance of the design. Below is the original two-colour design, which in itself is stylish, although you can see, adding more colours can change the appearance. Scrappy happy also works well, although, adding a base colour can add stability to the border.

Original Designhalf-square-Picture 1Rotating Blocks Rotating-blocks-2Changing Colour Ordercolour-order-change

This is just a few ideas, on how to use this simple block.

Congratulations on finishing your project!

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2 responses to “Beyond Basic Borders – Half Square and Quarter Square Triangles Block

  1. Wendy Kyser says:

    When I download the pattern it comes up as the half square Triangle Block. Could you resend this to me? Thanks. Loving these by the way.!!

    1. Debbie Lomas says:

      Hi Wendy, thank you for brining this to our attention. This has been corrected now. Debbie

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