Do you love the look of zig zag quilts? This FREE PATTERN will help you sew your own. With detailed instructions and pictures, this pattern is easy enough for a beginner. Depending on the fabrics you choose, this easy quilt would make a great gift idea for kids or adults. My daughter Chloe snatched this one up and put it on her bed as soon as it was done!

This quilt is not exactly bed sized, but at approximately 72” x 66”, it’s a generous throw quilt.

This blog post has been converted to an optional PDF that’s optimized for printing. Find it here. The blog post below is totally free to read, print, and sew! Just hit CTRL +P on your computer to print. The PDF download is inexpensive and optional.

You may have noticed that this quilt design is a modern take on the classic Baby Blocks quilt layout. Except baby blocks quilts have Y-seams. In order to eliminate those, I broke up the design into vertical rows that contain rhombus shapes and triangles.

Since the pieces are all fairly large, an experienced quilt maker could easily piece this quilt top in a day.

Even if you’re not all that experienced, this one is totally do-able. Just print up the templates, follow my easy instructions, and before you know it you’ll have a gorgeous modern quilt to snuggle up with!

Sparkle Quilt Pattern

Finished dimensions: approximately 72” x 66”.

{download the free quilt templates here}

You will need:

• 3 1/2 yards of print fabric (I used 8 purple fabrics and 6 orange fabrics – 1/4 yard of each – fat quarters will not work)
• 1 3/4 yards of background fabric (I used solid off-white)
• 1/2 yard fabric for binding
• 4 yards fabric for backing (more fabric may be required for directional prints or matching the pattern)

Cutting:

1. From the print fabric, cut 14 strips that are 8 3/4” x 40” (the fabric width). Use Template A (the rhombus) to cut 3 pieces from each strip until you have 40 pieces.

Note: If you want to have alternating colors of zig zags (like my quilt), cut 24 of one color and 16 of a second color.

2. From the background fabric, cut 7 strips that are also 8 3/4” tall. Use Template B (the triangle) to cut 7 pieces from each strip until you have 48 triangles.

Layout:

On a quilt design wall, a large bed, or your floor, lay out all of your pieces to familiarize yourself with how the vertical rows will be sewn together. This is very important.

Note that all 4 sides of the rhombus pieces are the same length, but each one must be turned in the correct orientation for the quilt pattern to work.

To begin with, there will be points at the top and bottom of the quilt. They will be trimmed off later.

Sewing the Vertical Rows:

Sewing the quilt’s vertical rows will be easy if you have laid out all of your pieces first. Sewing a triangle to a rhombus is simple as seen above.

Sewing a rhombus to a triangle is not as intuitive, so lay the two sides to be sewn together first, and then fold the second one over so they are right sides together.

It may seem tricky at first, but after your first 3 you’ll be an expert! 🙂

Sew all 8 vertical rows, pressing the seams open. (I’m generally a ‘press the seams to the dark side’ kind of quilter, but I found that pressing the seams open was more advantageous in this quilt because pressing to the darker pieces will cause the seam allowances to stack up when sewing the vertical rows together.)

After all of the vertical rows are pieced, pin and sew them together too. I don’t usually pin either, but I found it very helpful to pin the rows together where the rhombuses meet.

Press the seams open.

After all the seams are sewn and pressed, lay a long ruler along the top of the quilt and trim away the points 1/4” above the rhombus points. Make sure you don’t trim too close to the rhombus points or you will lose them in the binding! Repeat this step at the bottom of the quilt.

Quilt and bind as desired. I used my favorite Straight Line Quilting method.

If you make this quilt, be sure to tag #sewcanshe on Instagram – I’d love to see it! And make sure you check out my Quilted Things Pinterest board for more free quilt patterns!

xoxo,