10 ways to join fabric pieces together efficiently in Patchwork

If you’re a patchwork enthusiast looking to master seamlessly connecting fabric pieces, there are many techniques that not only ensure sturdy joining of these random pieces but also save time and at the same time enhance the overall aesthetic of your patchwork creations.

Materials you need to make patchwork

Fabric : The most important thing in patchwork is to choose fabric of the same type – of the same weight – printed or plain. Use fabrics that do not fray much or stretch. Color fastness is another criterion. Any types of cotton, different Silks and Linen are the most preferred. Very thin fabric mayneed lining or interfacing otherwise the seam allowance turnings, the fraying inside etc will be clearly seen outside.

Many love to do patchwork with old clothes, old household linen etc- the best recycle project ever.

Whatever fabric you use, always prewash the fabric. (Or atleast steam press with your steam iron to get the effect of prewashing) Learn more about prewashing fabric here.

Tools : The other important thing is to have templates and tools to draw and cut the fabric pieces for the patch pieces, accurately, so that they all match to make preplanned designs. A rotary cutter and self healing mat can be an asset in patchwork as you can cut multiple layers of fabric in one go. You may also want a plastic ruler. Square shaped clear rulers can be used to cut straight edges for your square and rectangular pieces and a protractor can be used to mark angles exactly.

Fussy cutting is a term used to indicate cutting motifs specifically from fabric so that they are highlighted in patchwork.  

How to plan your Patchwork

There are many established patterns in patchwork – some blocks which are celebrated and used frequently- like the nine patch block, log cabin block, star blocks. You can check out some of the most popular (55) quilt blocks in this post here

And some shapes which are most frequently used to cut the fabric pieces.

You can design your patchwork with the fabric you have by joining together square-shaped, rectangular-shaped, triangle-shaped, thin strip-shaped fabric pieces in a preplanned manner or a random manner. Some other very commonly used shapes are Triangles, Diamonds, Hexagons, Clamshells.

Patchwork can also be done with the help of templates – in fact this is an oft used and a very accurate method of doing patchwork. Templates are cut out of hard paper/cardboard or freezer paper or plastic sheet, or you can buy them from shops.

To make the template yourself the freezer paper template is ironed on to the fabric and then cut out. If you have heavy card template or the plastic ones, they are kept on the fabric and traced, seam allowances are added to this. They are then cut out and used.

Design your Patchwork

To plan the design of your patchwork, draw the design you have in mind on a piece of paper, then divide the block into the several parts as per your plan and then they are traced to another paper and added seam allowances as required  – cut out these paper templates.

Trace these templates on fabric. Cut these shapes from fabric and then join together to form the patchwork of your design.

High speed assembly methods are always welcome when joining countless fabric pieces for your wonderful design – learn all of those methods so that you can make beautiful patchwork in less amount of time.

10 methods used to join the patchwork fabric pieces

1. Chain piecing

Joining square or rectangular fabric pieces with a straight stitch – this is the usual way of sewing patchwork pieces.

You can hand sew or machine sew the straight edges. You can use a backstitch or a running stitch to sew small pieces of fabric together in patchwork. Hand sewing gives you some extra control especially when you are sewing with small pieces of fabric. Do not forget to secure the thread at the start and ending.

With a sewing machine you can use Chain piecing.  This is the time saving method of joining fabric pieces.

This is the method of sewing patch pieces continuously without breaking the thread in between or even lifting the presser foot – the pieces are sewn in a chain – this is done for convenience and time saving. After the sewing is done the thread is cut. 

2. Strip piecing

This is a time-saving method of joining fabric pieces together. In this method strips of fabrics are joined together and then they are cut apart. Afterward, they are joined in different sequences to form different patterns. 

3. Sewing 2-triangle units easily

Joining triangular pieces easily This is a method of making many numbers of 2-triangle square units easily.

Take the two square fabric pieces together which you want to join as 2-triangle  squares and mark diagonally across. Now sew on each side of this line, 1/4 inch apart from this line.

Now cut across the middle line. Open it up and you get two 2-triangle square units. You can read this more in detail here – How to join half triangle-squares for patchwork easily.

4. String piecing

This involves joining strips of fabric which may be of uneven width together to form the patchwork piece.

5. Stash and stitch method

If you have a number of fabric pieces in different colors and you want a vivid quilt in a crazy design this is the method that you can use.

In this method you cut out big square pieces from your fabrics. Stack all of them on top of each other – all rightside up. Ensure that no similar pieces are stacked together. 

Keep a scale somewhat diagonally on the top layers. Using a rotary cutter, Cut through all these layers across using a scale as the edge. Now move one of the pieces down. (This is the most important part) You have now shuffled the whole stack.

All of the sections are paired with a different fabric piece. You can now stitch the fabric pieces together.

You can stop at this point if you decide that you have the look you want. If you are not happy continue cutting and sewing in similar fashion. Till you get all jumbled up fabric pieces sewn to each other in a wild array of colors and prints. 

6. English paper piecing

This is a method used to join together geometric shapes like diamonds, hexagons, honeycombs, using paper templates. This is usually done by hand stitching.

Paper templates are cut out and then fabric is cut with extra seam allowance.

The paper piece is enclosed inside the fabric with the seam allowance turned inside and pressed – many units like this are formed and they are joined by carefully hand stitching the edges together. You can use a ladder stitch for this.

7. Crazy patchwork 

In this, the patchwork is made on top of another foundation fabric. Different sized fabric pieces (with straight edges) are kept on top of the foundation fabric cut in the size of patchwork you want. A cotton lining material is used as the foundation.

Keep the fabric pieces on the foundation fabric and join them using insertion stitches, hand embroidery stitches like feather stitch or fly stitch.  You can see an example of this in this post on making fabric from fabric scraps.

8. Somerset patchwork

In this method, small rectangular fabric pieces are folded into triangle shapes and then stitched on to a foundation piece of fabric. 

9. Reverse pieced foundation piecing for patchwork 

This method is used to make pretty designs and motifs on a patchwork with good accuracy. The fabric pieces are arranged in the design you want on the backside of the foundation fabric. The fabric pieces are then joined together along the edges.

10. Seminole Patchwork 

This involves joining fabric pieces and cutting them and then re-joining them in different sequences. They are then cut at an angle to form patterned designs

Join strips of fabric at an angle.

Mark at an angle and cut and you will get an angled band which can be used in many ways – especially as borders for blankets, quilts etc.

The common rules in sewing the patch pieces

Keep the fabric pieces rightsides together to the inside and join the seams. This is basic.

Do not forget to press the seams and seam allowances. Press seam allowance towards the darker fabric. 

Remember to press the seams in a row in the same direction.

After the whole patchwork is done, you may want to press the seam allowances open.

How to sew a 4 patch square block; How to sew log cabin block. ; Names of quilt blocks

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