Friendship Star Quilt Block Tutorial

The Friendship Star Quilt Block is one of the simplest quilt blocks, or at least, one of the simplest star quilt blocks. 

You just need 5 squares, and 4 half square triangles, all in the same size. 

Now don’t worry, I’m going to give you a more in-depth tutorial than that!

My version of the Friendship Star Quilt Block started with all of these itty-bitty half square triangles.  Side note, trimming HSTs is not my favorite part of quilting, but it makes everything go together much more smoothly.

The Friendship Star Quilt Block does not have to be scrappy, in fact, it’s probably often not made from scraps, but mine started with the leftover triangles from this Camellia quilt.

The half square triangles are trimmed down to 1½”, which means that they will finish at 1” in the quilt, and so this Friendship Star Quilt Block is a grand total of 3½” unfinished, or 3” finished.

No, no, no Darcy!  We don’t want to work with pieces that small! 

Don’t you worry, this tutorial is going to give you all of the tools to make your Friendship Star Quilt blocks in any size you want.

If you are like me, and you have to clean out the scrap box before you can buy any more fabric, make teeny tiny half square triangles and a scrappy quilt.  If that’s not your jam, or if you’ve already done a good job of cleaning out the scrap box, half square triangles and the Friendship Star Quilt Block can be made much larger.

Once you’ve settled on the size of your Friendship Star Quilt Block, the directions for how to make it will be the same across all sizes.

For each block you are going to need:

          1 Center Square- Star Fabric/Color

          4 Corner Squares- Background Fabric/Color

          2 HST Squares – Star Fabric/Color

          2 HST Squares – Background Fabric/Color

Start by matching the HST squares, each pair should have one star fabric/color and one background fabric/color.  For those needing one, this is a great Half Square Triangle tutorial.

Once you’ve got your Half Square Triangles made, trim them down to the same size as your center and corner squares.

When I started out making my stars, I didn’t know if the stars were supposed to rotate to the left or to the right.

To make sure I was giving you the best and correct information in this tutorial, I did a lot of research.  And by a lot, I mean that I looked at the first two rows of results in a Google image search.  Consensus is: there is no wrong way.  Make your Friendship Star Quilt Blocks however you like.

Lay out four HSTs, orienting the triangles to make the star, either spinning to the left or to the right.  Place a center square in the center, and the four corner squares in the… wait for it… four corners!

Next, sew the squares together, using a ¼” seam allowance, to make three rows.

Finally, sew the rows together to make a perfect Friendship Star.

Yes, my block is square. Even after pressing it multiple times, it just didn’t want to lay flat so it looks a little wonky.

You’re going to have to wait a bit to see how I put these little guys together.  Because I’m working with such small blocks, I need a bazillion of them.  No, not really.  I need 130.  But that’s still a lot, and while my Friendship Star Quilt Blocks started to pile up as the snow also piled up, and while I did a ton of sewing over a snowed-in three-day weekend, I’ve still got so many more blocks to make that the finished quilt will be coming soon-ish.

You know you’re adding “Make Friendship Star Quilt Blocks” to your quilty to-do list, so I’ve got a couple of questions for you.  Are you going to make your blocks as tiny as mine?  Or, will you make much larger blocks?  What color(s) will you make your blocks?