WITH EASY EPP SHAPES, THIS IS A GREAT PROJECT TO TAKE ON THE GO WITH YOU!
NOTES
■ RST = right sides together.
■ WOF = width of fabric.
■ Buy pre-cut packs of the paper
templates from sewmotion.com
FABRICS USED
■ Print fabrics are from the Alison Glass 2022 Sun Prints collection for Andover Fabrics.
■ Background fabric is the Optical White
Spectrum Solid from Makower.
PREPARATION
Group your rainbow fabrics into
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six pairs, referring to the Layout Diagram. Louisa paired pink (A) and purple (G); red (B) and orange (H); yellow (C) and mustard (I); light green (D) and dark green (J); aqua (E) and turquoise (K); dark blue (F) and light blue (L).
CUTTING OUT
From the background fabric cut: 2
■ One (1) 24in square.
Save the remaining fabric to baste the hexagons later.
From the binding fabric cut: 3
■ Three (3) 21/2in x WOF.
BASTING YOUR SHAPES
Use your templates to trace one
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hundred and fourteen (114) jewels and twenty four (24) hexagons onto your card and cut out neatly. Alternatively, you may choose to use commercially available EPP papers of the same size.
Place one jewel template on the
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wrong side of one of your rainbow fabrics, attaching with a dot of washable glue or a pin. Cut around the template, adding an approx 1/4in seam allowance all the way around (Fig A).
Repeat the process in step 5 to cut 6
pieces for the remaining jewel templates. You will need eleven jewels for each of the centre fabrics (Fabrics A– F), as well as eight jewels for each of the remaining fabrics (Fabrics G– L).
Working one template at a time, run
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a thin line of glue just in from the edge along one side of the card, then fold the fabric over, slightly pushing it against the paper’s edge to get a nice tight fold (Fig B). Repeat the process for each side of the shape, adding a little glue to the fabric at the corners too to help everything stick down securely (Fig C).
Using the same technique as you used 8
for cutting and basting the jewels, make up a total of twenty four hexagons from your background fabric.
PIECING YOUR WHEELS
9 Pick out one Jewel shape from Fabrics A to F to make up your centre wheel and lay them out in order, as shown in Fig 1.
10 To sew your shapes together using a flat back stitch, knot an approx 18in length of thread and bring it up from behind the seam allowance of your first Jewel (Fig D). Sew a stitch into the seam allowance to secure your thread. Insert your needle into the point of the second Jewel shape (Fig E) and connect the two with a couple of stitches sewn across the seam allowances.
11 Place a binding clip at the end of the seam to hold the pieces together. If you don’t have a binding clip, you can thread a second needle and secure the corners with a few stitches instead.
12 Now turn your unit around so you are sewing away from yourself. Picking up very little fabric from both sides, sew a flat back stitch down the whole seam (Fig F). When you get to the end of the seam, bring your thread through the loops of the last couple of stitches to knot securely and break the thread.
13 Add the next Jewel to this unit, following the same process in steps 10–12 (Fig G). Repeat to join the three units for the other side (Fig H).
14 Join the two halves together using flat back stitch, beginning at the centre and working outwards on each side (Figs I–J). This process helps you to match the centre seam neatly.
15 Repeat the process outlined in steps 10–14 in order to make each of the wheels required. You will need two each of the wheels shown in Fig 2 and one each of those shown in Fig 3.
16 Using the same flat back stitch, join a background hexagon to the six sides of the centre wheel (Fig 4). To save time and thread, once you have joined the two sides of the first hexagon, sew a small running stitch into the seam allowance of the wheel in order to take you to the point of the next seam to sew.
17 Arrange the next round of wheels, and attach hexagons to the outer sides as shown in Fig 5. Join these to the centre wheel. Finally, join the remaining wheels around the edge to complete (Fig 6).
18 Spray the panel with a gentle fabric starch and give it a good hot dry press from the front, particularly around the edges. Turn the unit over to the back, and gently peel back the seam allowances to remove the papers. Press the back again to neatly flatten the seams.
19 Give the 24in square of background fabric a good press and fold it in half lengthwise and finger press the crease. Unfold and do the same widthwise. Open out and use these crease marks to centre the panel on top. Pin from the centre outwards so that you don’t have an excess of fabric at the back, and sew down the edges using a slip stitch.
FINISHING THE WALLHANGING
20 Press the wall hanging top and the backing fabric. Make a quilt sandwich
by placing the backing fabric right side down, the batting on top, then place the pressed wall hanging centrally and right side up. Baste the layers together using your preferred method.
21 Quilt as desired. Louisa machine quilted straight lines following the ‘V’ shapes created by the colour segments of the design. She also left out a couple of lines in each segment to add some interest to the quilting design.
22 Trim off the excess batting and backing fabric and square up the wall hanging to measure 24in square.
23 Sew the binding strips together end-to-end using diagonal seams. Press the seams open and trim away the dog ears. Fold in half lengthways, wrong sides together, and then press.
24 Sew the binding to the right side of the wall hanging, creating a neat mitre at each corner. Fold the binding over to the back and secure in place temporarily with binding clips. Hand stitch into place around the edges to finish.