How to upsize a quilt pattern (including a handy calculator)
As you know, I can be quite impatient (they don’t call me the impatient quilter for nothing), so I’m always looking for ways to speed up the quilting process. And one of my favourite ways to do that is to upsize a quilt - why make 16 blocks, when you can make four and get the same sized quilt? Or why make make a baby sized quilt when you can make a throw sized quilt for the same amount of cuts :-)
I’ve upsized a few quilts including upsizing Lo and behold Stitchery’s baby size deco quilt to a throw size (it’s a much simpler design and I like all the negative space), which you can see below.
I’ve also started on Liza Taylor Handmade’s Always Forever quilt pattern- I’ve only made one phrase so far but it’s such a fun one to make!
I also want to upsize Penelope Handmade’s Meadowlark quilt to just do one block (like the baby size) and make it into a throw size- which is what prompted me to write this little tutorial.
It’s actually pretty straightforward to calculate how big your pieces need to be and I’ll include both the calculation yourself if you like maths, or a little calculator below, which you can use if you prefer not to use your maths brain :-) A quick note: this works best for pieces that are not HSTs or flying geese- you can use it to calculate your final HST or flying goose size but the cuts you need to make to make these shapes may need to be adjusted.
Start off by thinking about how big you want your quilt to be- I recommend sticking with straightforward numbers like 1.5 or 2x bigger- if you start doing more unusual numbers, your pieces might become a little weirdly shaped (no one wants to be cutting a piece that’s 3 and 5/8 inches :-)
For the Deco Quilt, the baby size is 45” x 50” - I decided to make it 1.5x larger so it ended up being 67.5” x 75”- a lovely throw size!
In terms of figuring out fabric requirements, a good rule of thumb is just to multiply the amount of fabric you need by the amount you are upsizing your quilt (eg if you are making your quilt 1.5x larger and you need 1 yard of Fabric A, you could consider 1.5. yards of Fabric A). Please note, you may end up with a little extra fabric depending on how the larger size pieces fit together so take this as general guidance only!
For each of your pieces, you can use the calculator below, or follow the following calculation:
(Length - 0.5) x Upsize ratio + 0.5
(Width - 0.5) x Upsize ratio + 0.5
We do this because we want to take away the seam allowance before upsizing, then adding the seam allowance back at the end.
So say a piece you need to cut is 10.5” x 2.5” and you want to upsize it by 1.5
First we will calculate the length
(10.5 - 0.5) x 1.5 - 0.5 = 15.5”
Then the width:
(2.5-0.5) x 1.5 - 0.5 = 3.5”
Or, just use the calculator below :-)
I hope that makes sense, but if you have any questions, let me know! :-)
