How to make a square in a square quilt block
This is the easiest way to make a square in a square quilt block. It may appear that you’re wasting a lot of fabric but I always keep the scraps to use later in a crumb quilt. Or I turn the excess 2 corner triangles into a half square triangle.
Let’s learn how to make this block in 2 minutes:
Block size
5 1/2 inch square.
Cutting instructions
- 1 square, 5 1/2″ x 5 1/2″.
- 4 squares, 3″ x 3″.
Square in a square quilt ideas
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My book Turnabout Patchwork
“Turnabout Patchwork. Simple quilts with a twist” is all about playing with blocks – making a block, slicing it up, and turning or repositioning the pieces to make a completely different block (sometimes two smaller blocks) to yield endless quilt tops.
Buy individual chapters of my book
Now that my publisher is going out of business I have bought the rights to publish my book. Now you can download individual chapters. Each digital download is a bundle with 4 quilt patterns in it.
As well as the instructions and fabric needs to make the blocks you’ll find a section on quiltmaking basics at the end of the pattern that discusses:
- Tools
- Squaring up blocks
- Borders
- Assembly and quilting
- Binding
See all the quilts in the book in a real life project
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Sewn Up 
One of the things my mom does when making blocks like this is she’ll go an extra half inch away from the original stitching line and sew again. Then she cuts in between those lines and will have leftover half square triangles instead of a bunch of triangles laying around.
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That’s a clever tip! I’ll take note of it! Thank you.
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I love this, and how easy you make it look to make!
One thing. I’m trying to use some fabric that needs to have a 6 1/2″ square as the focus. Do you know what size squares I would use for that? Or, how do I figure it out?
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Test this out first. Divide the large square by 2 and add 1/2″ to it for the seam allowance. So that would be 3 1/4″ + 1/2″ = 3 3/4″.
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Thank you for the simple tutorial. I’m just starting out really and this looks like a nice one to experiment with. I can’t wait to try this out! Thank you again.
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Thank you 😊 Angeal
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Ty, I was wondering how to make that block!
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What are dimensions or the relative dimensions of the small and large blocks?
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The block is 5 1/2″
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What is the measurement for the small block, would they be 3 1/2?
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Jeanne the video has all the measurements
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Love your videos and book! What is the finished size of this block? How do you do the math to figure a finished block size. Does the original size of the center block always end up being the finished size as well? Thank you
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You’ve got the details on the video. I haven’t figured out all the sizes sorry.
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