I’m working on a quilt where the designer chose not to use partial seams where they would have worked really well. This decision might have been based on classifying the pattern as suitable for beginners. I have always thought that less seams means not only less work, but less room for error. This is the way the block was designed, which requires 8 seams.
I went with this design, which requires 4 seams.
This is the math. (Don’t be afraid, it’s not complicated)
The strips are the width of unfinished border x (length of inside unfinished block + the width of the unfinished border – ½”) Subtracting the ½” takes a ¼ “ seam allowance into consideration.
If your inside block is 6 1/2” x 6 1/2” and the borders are 2 ½ ”, cut the strips 8 ½ ” (6 ½” + 2 ½” – ½ “) x 2 ½ “
Here’s how it goes together.
I hope that you will incorporate partial seams in future projects. It really is a nice way to border a block.
