ESSENTIAL GUIDE
“The hexagon shape is a long-time favourite in patchwork and always creates interesting effects.” – Lin Clements
THE HEXAGON
The hexagon is a six-sided geometric shape that has been popular in patchwork for centuries. Long before sewing machines were invented, the shape was sewn by hand, usually over paper in an English paper piecing or mosaic patchwork technique, and some memorable scrap quilts have been created in this way. We looked at the hand method of English paper piecing in Issues 80 and 81 of Today’s Quilter, so in this article we will focus on the machine-sewn technique.
We will start by looking at the mathematical properties of the hexagon and how we can draw this shape. This is very useful as it means that you will be able to create a hexagon template any size you like. More often than not, a hexagon size is based on a single side measurement, but we also explore the other mathematical properties of the shape. Some prepared templates are provided in the Templates sections, and you will also find this month’s gift useful, which has 1in hexie papers.
In this article, we will also look at two methods of sewing hexagons. The main method is one that uses set-in seams for whole hexagons; the second method uses half hexagons and
