Skyrocket quilt block

April 24, 1933-Quilt Is Equally Effective in Vivid or Pastel Colors was the title of Nancy Cabot's Chicago Tribune article presenting the Skyrocket block.  This is one of my favorite blocks so far.  I see it as a nine patch pattern on point with pieced triangles on the corners.

Of this pattern, Nancy wrote, "The skyrocket pattern, if fitting to your personality and your general scheme of things, presents an opportunity for you to exhibit a showy burst of color in your quilt that will rival the brilliance of fireworks."

This statement made me think of the 4th of July and patriotic colors so I made my block in red, white and blue.

She also said the pattern was "quite adaptable to the popular powdery pastels used so much in modern interiors."




In making this block into a 6" block, I used paper piecing to avoid cutting odd size pieces.  I got so involved in making this very easy block that I forgot to take pictures along the way!  So here's the only one I got but at least it shows how it goes together. You can get the pattern here.

Eleanor Burns has a video making this block from templates. Watch it here.  It's on the second half of the video.








I also made the block using 2 1/2" squares which makes it very adaptable to using jelly roll, charm pack or layer cake pre-cuts.  It makes an 8 1/2" finished block.  I still used paper piecing for the corners because to me it's the easiest and fastest.  I hope to make a tutorial for making this block so stay tuned!

Skyrocket 8 1/2" block

I had been thinking about making a scrappy quilt using this block.  I did a search on the internet and look what I found! I love, love, love it!! I find it interesting that the quiltmaker made the center star and the sections I made in blue, scrappy.  This pattern for the block is however credited to Ruby McKim, another quilter writing patterns for a different newspaper in the 1930's.  I don't know if Ruby McKim showed the colors placed like this or the quiltmaker interpreted it this way.  That's the beauty of quilting.  You can make any quilt your own design.  And did she mean to cut off all the points in her border?

Click to go to the original article about the quilt by Barbara Brackman.

Tomorrow-Daisy Swirl