Hello, friends! It’s Julia from Bayhill Studio, and I am excited to share my Giant Granny Square Trip Around the World quilt featuring fabric from the breathtaking new Eden collection designed by Gabrielle Neil.
The vibrant colors and detailed artistry in this fabric collection are showcased beautifully in the repeating and contrasting rows. This ended up being a nice sized throw quilt, measuring approximately 61″ square. It could easily be made larger by adding more squares to each row.
There are many ways to make a Trip Around the World Quilt. I made a scrappy version with just one square that repeated HERE. You can make one repeating design to look like a giant granny square like I did here, or you can create sections that echo outward. You can make the chains into a square shaped repeat like I did, or turn it on a diagonal. These are just a few options and ways to make your quilt unique for you.
Here is a closer look at these gorgeous fabrics. The color palette is a brilliant mix of secondary and tertiary colors that perfectly compliment each other. I’m completely smitten with the strawberry print, and the tiny flowers, and the Shibori…I love them all!
To make this quilt, I opted to use 3″ squares. Any size square is fine, although most Trip Around the World quilts are made up of squares on the smaller side.
I repeated the Magenta Hexagon print, and the small orange Wildflowers print. All other prints were used only once. For this quilt, I decided to place the bright magenta Hexagon, the Stargazer Strawberry, Stargazer Main, and the Stargazer Wildflowers strategically next to color groupings that were slightly more subtle. By doing this they stand out and draw attention — emphasizing the square pattern in this quilt design. Notice the Stargazer Strawberry print frames the center section, the Stargazer Main contrasts with the blue and Mustard prints, and the Magenta Hexagon provides contrast to the mustard and orange prints. The Stargazer Wildflowers on the outside creates a nice frame.
Here is the grid I made to map out where I wanted my fabrics to go. If you want to make an identical quilt, you can use this map, or make your own with some graph paper.
Trip Around the World quilts are often made strips sewn into blocks, which are then assembled into rows. This works really well when making a quilt where there are repeating squares. With this quilt being one large square, I knew that piecing blocks wouldn’t save time and could even be confusing, so I decided to piece entire rows.
I started by chain piecing the outer area starting with the Mustard Stripe and working outward. Next, I chain pieced the center section. Because each row in the center section was a little different, I used my graph to make sure I assembled the order of each row correctly. Finally, I added the outer section to each end of the center strips and pressed.
You don’t have to worry about pressing in opposite directions. Because each end of the strip mirrors the other, you can flip them in either direction so the seams nest perfectly.
Thanks to my chart, chain piecing turned out to be super fast and easy. All of the rows were finished in a morning!
After finishing the rows, I laid them all out to make sure I didn’t skip any. Then all that is left is to sew them together. Easy and so pretty!
You can arrange the prints in any order you like. I grouped mine by color, but you could go for a scrappier look by arranging them in a more random order.
I added a 2 1/2″ border of the Stargazer Wildflowers print. I love how we get to see more of those gorgeous flowers. I found the quilt was still measuring a little small for my liking, so I added a 2″ border of the Mustard Main print.
The quilt back is the Orange Le Creme Swiss Dot. Swiss Dot is one of Riley Blake’s Basics that I hope stays around for ever — it makes the BEST quilt backs!
The binding is the beautiful Pink Shibori print. What can I say…I LOVE this print! I usually bind quilts with a darker color to really frame the entire quilt, but I took a risk and used the pale pink, and I absolutely love how it looks!
That’s all there is to it! A simple, charming, and timeless quilt design and gorgeous fabrics makes the perfect pair.
Thank you for stopping by! Feel free to reach out with any questions or comments, and be sure to subscribe to my YouTube Channel and follow me on Instagram for more creative content and project inspiration. Have a blessed day!