Guides

Quilt Block Patterns, Sorted by the Seam Each One Needs

Published 2026-10-15. Updated 2026-10-15.

A quilt block pattern is a named unit of patches that you repeat. Learn them by the seam they need, not by how busy they look. Straight seams come first: four patch, nine patch, and rail fence. Half-square triangles come next: friendship star, churn dash, and bear paw. Quarter-square triangles and flying geese come after that: Ohio star and variable star. Paper piecing is a separate skill, used when a tutorial builds the points on a paper foundation.

Size is a second label, not part of the name. A block that finishes at 12 inches measures 12 1/2 inches before it is sewn into the quilt, because a quarter-inch seam on each side adds a half inch, according to the Piece Corps Quilters Guild. Generations Quilt Patterns uses the same rule on a smaller example: a 6.5-inch finished block is 7 inches unfinished.

A block is a repeatable unit

The pattern is the drawing: which patches, in which places. The quilt is many copies of that drawing, sometimes mixed with a second block. SewCanShe calls four patch and nine patch the building blocks that more complicated designs sit on. Love Patchwork & Quilting makes the same point with units: a flying geese unit, a half-square triangle, and a quarter-square triangle can be a block by themselves or a piece inside a star.

Quilting Daily hosts a library of 150+ free block patterns, from straight-seam blocks through traditional and more demanding ones. The captured page is the library door: 150+ free patterns, with each block named on its own pattern page. The named list below is the 35 tutorials SewCanShe spells out, plus the ten-block set from Love Patchwork & Quilting where it adds a unit.

The plain cross block is coming soon at $4.00.

Straight seams before triangles

These blocks use squares or strips and a quarter-inch seam. No triangle to trim.

• Four patch and nine patch. SewCanShe treats both as the base that other blocks build on. Cutting charts are on the four patch quilt pattern and nine patch quilt pattern pages.
• Rail fence. SewCanShe describes it as strips. Turn the blocks and the stripes change direction.
• Mini log cabin. Strips around a center. The full round-by-round method, including courthouse steps, is on the log cabin quilt pattern page.
• Grandmother's cross, in the SewCanShe version, is built from four patches or from nine patches.
• Hashtag. A square grid, listed with the straight tutorials.

If a block on this list also has triangles, it is in the next section, not here.

Stars that need half-square triangles

A half-square triangle is two right triangles sewn on the diagonal. The method and the cut-size charts are on the half-square triangle quilt patterns page. These captured descriptions name the unit:

• Friendship star. SewCanShe: squares and half-square triangles, a nine-patch layout, stitched for nearly a hundred years.
• Churn dash. Love Patchwork & Quilting: half-square triangles and bar units, named in the early 1800s because it reads as a butter churn from above. SewCanShe gives the same early-1800s date.
• Bear paw. SewCanShe: half-square triangles lined up, and that tutorial paper-pieces the triangles. The block page is bear paw quilt block.
• Half-square triangle block itself, when the unit is the whole block.
• Yankee puzzle. SewCanShe: a quilt of pinwheels.
• Pinwheel mosaic. A pinwheel wrapped in more piecing.
• Snowball. A square with triangles in the corners, used beside other blocks so the design continues.
• Flying geese. A rectangle with a point. SewCanShe's tutorial makes four geese from five squares. Dutchman's puzzle, on the same list, is eight flying geese arranged as a pinwheel.
• Variable star. SewCanShe says it uses the same shortcut as the flying geese lesson.

Quarter-square triangles are the next seam. A quarter-square triangle is four right triangles in one square. SewCanShe's quarter-square triangle block finishes at 12 inches. Ohio star, in the Love Patchwork & Quilting library, is a nine patch of quarter-square triangles around a center square, known since the early 1800s. The construction is on the Ohio star quilt block page.

Sawtooth star is in that same library, first published in 1884 in Farm and Fireside, drawn like the teeth of a saw. The block page is sawtooth star quilt block. Lone star, also there, is an eight-point star of diamond patches, traditionally joined with Y-seams, and often strip-pieced now.

Curves, applique, and paper

SewCanShe's orange peel tutorial uses appliqué. The same block can be sewn with curved seams, which that page names as the other method. Drunkard's path is the curved-seam lesson on the same list.

Paper piecing is the skill of sewing onto a printed foundation so the points stay put. SewCanShe's bear paw tutorial paper-pieces the half-square triangles. Love Patchwork & Quilting says a log cabin can be template-pieced or foundation paper pieced as well as machine pieced in the ordinary way. A first paper foundation is on the foundation paper piecing page.

The remaining names on the 35-tutorial list are real blocks, and the blurb leaves the units to the tutorial: butterfly, sailboat, spinning spools, beach house, bowtie, on-point heart, double diamonds, pop rox, patchwork house, simple pine tree, and classic pineapple. Pineapple is a log-cabin cousin in the Love Patchwork & Quilting library: strips on opposite sides and opposite corners, trimmed each round, like courthouse steps. Open the tutorial before you assume the seam.

Raw size versus sewn-in size

Finished size is the block after its edges are sewn into the quilt. Unfinished size is the raw block on your table.

Piece Corps: an unfinished block still has a quarter-inch seam allowance on each edge, so it is a half inch larger than the finished block. Their example is a 12 1/2 inch unfinished block, which finishes at 12 inches. You lose a quarter inch on the left and a quarter inch on the right, which is a half inch from the width, and the same from the height. The four seams are two pairs. The width loses a half inch, and the height loses a half inch, rather than a full inch from one measurement.

Generations states the same arithmetic the other way: if a pattern says the block is 6.5 inches finished, add a half inch and the unfinished block is 7 inches. That extra half inch is the seam that disappears when the blocks are joined. Start from the finished size when you are drafting your own patches, because the seam allowance is what you add, and different techniques add different amounts.

There is no single "quilt block size." Patterns in these pages use 6.5 inches, 12 inches, and other finished sizes for the same named block. Pick the finished size that divides the quilt you want, then add the seam. Bed sizes are on the quilt size chart.

Thirty-five named tutorials

This is the SewCanShe list, in the page's order, so a search for a name lands here even when the blurb is short.

1. Four patch.
2. Nine patch.
3. Half-square triangle.
4. Quarter-square triangle, finishing at 12 inches.
5. Friendship star.
6. Flying geese.
7. Variable star.
8. Ohio star.
9. Nine-patch chain.
10. Pinwheel mosaic.
11. Mini log cabin.
12. Yankee puzzle.
13. Orange peel, appliqué in this tutorial.
14. Butterfly.
15. Shoo fly.
16. Churn dash.
17. Sailboat.
18. Dutchman's puzzle.
19. Economy.
20. Star in a star.
21. Spinning spools.
22. Snowball.
23. Beach house.
24. Hashtag.
25. Bowtie.
26. On-point heart.
27. Double diamonds.
28. Pop rox.
29. Drunkard's path.
30. Bear paw.
31. Patchwork house.
32. Simple pine tree.
33. Classic pineapple.
34. Rail fence.
35. Grandmother's cross.

Love Patchwork & Quilting's ten-block set overlaps that list and adds sawtooth star and lone star, plus the flying-geese, half-square, and quarter-square units.

An order for learning them

Sew the four patch until the center seam meets. Sew a nine patch until the rows nest. Then sew half-square triangles and a friendship star, which is those two skills in one block. Churn dash and bear paw add more of the same triangles. Ohio star is the point to learn quarter-square triangles. Curves and paper piecing can wait until the quarter-inch seam is boring.

A block that looks complicated is often one of these with the values placed so the seams disappear. Love Patchwork & Quilting points readers at blocks that look difficult and are still beginner-friendly once the unit is familiar. The disappearing nine patch quilt is that trick on a nine patch: cut the block apart and turn the pieces. The log cabin is the strip version of the same idea.

Plain Cross Block

$4.00Coming soon

• Quilting Daily: 150+ Free Quilt Block Patterns
• SewCanShe: How Many of These 35 Classic Quilt Blocks Have You Made?
• Piece Corps Quilters Guild: What is What in Quilting
• Love Patchwork & Quilting: Inspiring quilt blocks for quilters of all abilities
• Generations Quilt Patterns: Finished vs. unfinished quilt block sizes