Patchwork Pincushion Tutorial

 How to Make a Pincushion - Patchwork Pin Cushion. DIY Tutorial.

What you need:

Normal paper
Pen
Ruler
Assorted patterned Liberty fabric strips 5-6” long/1” inch wide
4 solid fabric strips (5-6” long/1” wide)
Fabric square 5-6” for the backing of the pin cushion
Your preferred filling (toy filling or rice)

Assembly
Cut out 4 paper squares of 3×3 “

Place your solid fabric strip across the diagonal of the first fabric square. I use a little glue to keep it in place.

Place your first patterned fabric, right side down, on top of the solid strip and sew with a ¼” seam allowance along the aligned edge right through the paper. It is very important that you reduce the stitch length to 1.5 for this as it creates a perforation on the paper, which helps to tear it off later.

Then iron open. You could finger press instead of ironing but ironing does produce the more accurate result.

Repeat the process with the second strip and keep doing so until you have the entire paper square covered.

Flip the square over and trim the excess fabric along the paper edges.

Repeat for the other 3 squares and arrange them so that the solid strips form a square within the square and sew the pieces together with the paper still attached. Once sewn together peel the paper off.

To finish the pincushion put the fabric square for the backing right sides together with the front and sew all around with a ¼ “ seam allowance (with normal stitch length) leaving a small opening in the middle of one side.

Clip the corners, turn around, poke out the corners with a pointy non-sharp object such as a chopstick and fill the cushion with your preferred filling. I use rice mixed with lavender because I like my pincushion to be heavy and above all fragrant! The last step is to close the opening with a few hand stitches.

The method can be used for any size block you wish to make and would look great as a 9” block repeated for a quilt.