Magical Circle quilt block

Magical Circle

October 25, 1933-"Old, but surprisingly modern in appearance, is this quaintly named Magical Circle quilt pattern. It's a variation of the old and famous Necktie design, with the blocks placed to form a circle. It's attractive in either prints or plain colors." This is what Nancy Cabot had to say when publishing her Magical Circle quilt pattern in the Chicago Tribune.


Nancy's Necktie quilt pattern was published on May 13, 1933. You can read my post about the Necktie block to find many different ways to make the block.







I used a different method for my Magical Circle quilt block than I used for my Necktie block. I used the stitch and flip method as shown below. Place a 1 1/4" square on a 2" square and sew on the diagonal as shown. Iron on the sewn line so the right side of the fabric flips over to show the front side.

For each of four sections you need the following parts, two 2" squares of fabric for the tie and two blocks as shown above. To summarize, you need- 8 2" background squares, 8 2" tie fabric squares and 8 1 1/4" tie fabric squares. 

Sew the four blocks together to create one section of your Magical Circle quilt block as shown below and then sew the four new sections together.

The four smaller blocks can also be arranged in many different ways to create an entirely different quilt block design. Send me a photo if you've made a quilt using this block or a variation of it and I'll post it!

The Magical Circle quilt block can be found in Electric Quilt's Blockbase program as #1429a.

I found several Magical Circle quilts to look at. Just click on the links below.
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=51-8C-3B6
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=4D-85-14E
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=1E-3D-1063
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=16-33-64
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=50-8A-F8F
http://www.quiltindex.org/fulldisplay.php?kid=50-8A-9F2

Tomorrow-Cluster of Stars