Hexie Spectrum Quilt Pattern

The Pattern

The Hexie Spectrum Quilt combines machine piecing and English Paper Piecing (EPP) to create a unique quilt.

The Hexie Spectrum Quilt has a rainbow color scheme displayed in a diagonal to keep your eye moving while you look at the quilt. Each colored machine block is different, so the quilt is like a sampler quilt in that regard. The pattern is a great starter EPP quilt pattern. The Hexie Spectrum Quilt also destroys scraps.

Development

The Hexie Spectrum Quilt pattern is the first machine piecing and EPP applique quilt I actually ever designed. When I was hosting the Hexie Flower SAL, I was starting to come up with ideas to follow the SAL up with. I wanted the follow up to keep having hexie flowers made of 1″ hexies that were appliqued, but I wanted more than just that.

I wanted the kitchen sink of quilt patterns. I wanted it to devour scraps, but also have yardage and FQ options. I wanted machine piecing, but I didn’t want repetitive blocks. I wanted eye movement across the qulit. I wanted everything.

This pattern is the longest I have ever spent in the developmental stage on a quilt pattern. Normally I have an idea, then it is all just math and the technical work of getting it into a pattern. The idea phase is usually as brief as a minute to maybe a couple hours. The Hexie Spectrum Quilt pattern went through so many idea phases and colored pencil drafts, it was very unlike me. It took months until I was truly happy with my mock up. I was about to fall asleep one night and the last block that was holding me up just popped into my head so I got up, sketched it out really quickly, then finally fell asleep.

The Name

The Hexie Spectrum Quilt pattern’s name is a reference to the use of hexies and both the rainbow color scheme and the diagonal rainbow layout.

Fabric Requirements & Size

The quilt comes in one size 60 x 60″, but the pattern would be easily adaptable to make a larger or smaller quilt.

The quilt pattern is mostly written for scraps, but there are four options for fabric requirements:

• Scraps (included in the pattern)
• Fat eighths (F8s)
• Fat Quarters (FQs)
• Yardage

Difficulty Level

The difficulty level for this pattern is Beginner. This is in reference to the difficulty for over all construction, machine piecing, and EPP.

EPP

English Paper Piecing (EPP) is a form of hand sewing. I have a series of introductory blog posts on it that can be found on my website. Quilts that are entirely EPP take a relatively long time to complete, so this pattern offers an opportunity to make an EPP quilt far quicker than you normally could. This pattern uses 1” hexagons for the EPP blocks, which are a classic and extremely popular size/shape. This is great because you can reuse the paper pieces for a future project (EPP papers are usually good for 2-4 projects, depending on how well you treat them). This is a perfect EPP starter pattern. I strongly urge EPP beginners to use an applique pattern to start with because you can finish the project relatively quickly, so it is not as big of a commitment.

The Sew Along

There will be a chill and easy to keep up with sew along (SAL) for this quilt pattern. I will be announcing the SAL very soon.

Final Message

I hope you feel that this pattern inspires you to work some EPP magic to destroy scraps, dent your stash, or is just a good excuse to buy fabric.

You can now purchase the pattern here.