BLOG: Quilt Tutorials

For the most part, giant applique is the same as regular applique – trace, rough cut, fuse, clean cut, fuse again.

If you’re new to applique with fusible adhesive, do NOT start with a giant block. There’s a post here with very detailed instructions, and you can follow along with one of my free patterns. Make at least one “normal-sized” block, and then come back and tackle giant blocks. 😁

In this lesson I’m going to show you how to handle the quirks of giant applique.

Tracing Your Enlarged Pattern

There are two things different with this step.

One – you’ll need to “explode” the pattern yourself. That is – separate the pieces and mark where any extra seam allowance for underlap is.

Two – when you enlarge the pattern, you also enlarge the lines of the pattern. Depending on how thick the lines were to start with and how much you enlarged it – the lines can get to be 1/4 inch thick – or even more! Where do you trace and cut?

This video shows you how to tackle both of those issues.

Not hard – just a couple of things you need to think about. 🙂

What If the Pattern Piece Is Bigger than the Biggest Fusible Adhesive You Can Buy?

Post it notes are my secret weapon. 🙂

The Heat & Bond Lite that I prefer is available by the bolt – so the length is unlimited, but the width is just 17 inches. That will work for a lot of patterns – but not all of them. And who knows how big you’ll make future projects? Maybe you’ll make a king-size quilt with one enormous applique in the middle. It’s possible! 🙂

How to Position and Fuse Your Applique When It’s Bigger than Your Ironing Board

There are two possibilities here. 

If your image is symmetrical, it’s possible to build it from the neck up – bit by bit. That’s how I did this giant fox block.

If your image isn’t symmetrical, you’ll need to position everything on a flat surface, pin it, move it to your ironing board, and then fuse it section by section. That’s what I do with this bunny block.

So that’s the applique itself. What about the next step?

Using Thicker Thread

In addition to scaling up the applique pieces, I also like to scale up the stitching that outlines them. I do that by using thicker thread. 

12 weight is the thickest thread you can use in a standard sewing machine, so that’s what I use. I almost always use Sulky 12 wt. thread in black. On the rare occasion when I outline in a color, I use smaller Sulky Petites spools.

Outlining with thick thread is pretty much the same as outlining with regular thread, with just a couple of exceptions.

One – you need to use a needle with a larger eye. I use 90/14 topstitching needles and they work great.

Two – do NOT use the thicker thread in your bobbin. Use a regular weight thread for the bobbin.

Since your thread weight doesn’t match your bobbin weight, you may need to adjust your tension a bit. Stitch up a quick row of stitching using the same weight batting you’ll be using and different color threads in the top and the bobbin. Adjust the tension as needed until the bobbin thread doesn’t show on the top and the top thread doesn’t show on the bottom. Make a note of the new tension and use that every time you’re topstitching with your heavy threads and you won’t need to test it again. (I recommend writing it right on the spool.)

There’s a post here with more detail about stitching with thicker thread.

Using Multiple Lines of Stitching

If you don’t want to mess with using thicker thread, you can always go around all the shapes more than once for a thicker line. I find that three passes with regular thread gives about the same definition as one pass with the thicker thread. I actually like the sketchy look of multiple lines, but I don’t always want to go around all the pieces three times. It really just depends on my mood. 🙂

This post has more info (and a video) about scribbly outlining.

Here are links to all the Think BIG lessons. . .

• Intro and Tools and Supplies – a look some samples of projects made with giant applique, plus an overview of any special tools and supplies you’ll need
• Enlarging Your Pattern – how to figure out how big you’ll need it to be, and how to print giant template pieces
• Tips and Tricks for Giant Applique – what do you do if the pattern piece is bigger than your fusible adhesive, if it won’t fit on your ironing board, and how to scale up your outline stitching

You have a few options for enlarging any pattern.

If you’re just enlarging it a little bit, you might be able to get away with following the instructions in this post.

But if you want to make it really big, you’ll need to go to a copy shop with an oversized printer to print your pattern pages. I checked with Kinkos, Staples and Office Max in my area and all of them can print large sheets – so you should be able to find an option near you. 

The Kinkos in my town charges $0.75 per square foot for oversized printing – not a bad deal at all. (That’s for black and white printing. Color is a LOT more expensive, so print your patterns in black and white even though the size reference square might be in color.)

Kinkos is my favorite print shop – and the folks there answered all of my questions. Basically – they said you can do either of these options. . .

Have Them Enlarge It for You

You can print your image out (print any page from any pattern at 100% scale) and bring it in to the shop. Ask them to enlarge it for you. They’ll scan the image and print it out to any size you want.

What size should you make it? I design all my applique patterns to fit in a 10 inch block because that makes the math really easy.

If you want to enlarge it to fit in a 14 inch block – ask them to print it at 140%.

If you want to enlarge it to fit in a 25 inch block – ask them to print it at 250%.

If you want to enlarge it to fit in a 36 inch block – ask them to print it at 360%.

Whatever size you want – just add a 0 to the % enlargement. Easy peasy.

They can also do this if you save the PDF to a flash drive. Just tell them what page of the PDF you want printed out and what size.

Enlarge It Yourself Using Any Photo Editing Program

This option allows you to use the self-service printer, if that’s on option at your copy shop. It is at mine.

This option is a little more work for you – and requires a bit of ease with computers – but you don’t need any fancy programs. I’m using GIMP in the video (it’s a free program) but you can use Photoshop (including the bare-bones Photoshop options that you can get for free) or any other photo editing software out there. It’s just resizing – so it’s not an advanced tool or skill.

Here’s a video showing two things – how to import an image from a PDF into your editing program, and how to calculate what size you need the new image to be.

FYI – this video was originally part of a class that included patterns for the projects shown here. Now the lesson is free, but the video still includes references to the patterns included for those projects.

Just to clarify a couple of points. . .

Opening vs. Importing

If you’re using a JPG file, you can just open it in your editing program. You don’t need to go through the extra steps of importing it.

PDFs are designed to be consistent across multiple platforms and operating systems, so you can’t just open them and start playing around. You need to import the specific page you want to work with. The import process converts the image to an editable format. After you import it, you can treat it just like a JPG file that you simply opened.

All of my patterns are downloadable PDF files, so you can use any block from any quilt pattern for any project!

Image Size vs. Block Size

The block size is the finished size of the quilt block that an image is appliqued to.

The image size is the size of the image to be appliqued onto that block. The image size will always be smaller than the block size, so that there’s room between the image and the edges of the block.

So, for the example in the video, the image size is the actual size of the cat drawing. The block size is the quilt block that image will fit into. My finished block sizes are always 10 inches. The images are usually 8-9 inches at their widest or tallest point, so they can fit in a 10 inch block with a little breathing room all around. 

That Formula

I don’t want you to have to scroll through the entire video if you’re just reminding yourself of the formula. Here it is.

You can use this formula for reducing an image too. Maybe you want to scale the image down to fit into a 6 inch space on the front of a T-shirt? The same formula will work.

Here are links to all the Think BIG lessons. . .

• Intro and Tools and Supplies – a look some samples of projects made with giant applique, plus an overview of any special tools and supplies you’ll need
• Enlarging Your Pattern – how to figure out how big you’ll need it to be, and how to print giant template pieces
• Tips and Tricks for Giant Applique – what do you do if the pattern piece is bigger than your fusible adhesive, if it won’t fit on your ironing board, and how to scale up your outline stitching

You can always enlarge or reduce the size of any of my applique patterns, but if you make them really big you can introduce some challenges.

In this series of posts we’re going to learn some easy techniques for working with extra-large applique.

It’s fun! And the large size means the projects come together super fast. 🙂

Add appliques to large patterns of almost any size.

Here are just a few samples I made. . .

I made a giant floor pillow using the Fergal Fox pattern. This is a 26-inch pillow.

Not every applique has to be quilted! I made a giant (24 x 36 inch) poster using one of the cats from the Cuddly Cats pattern.

This would be a great project to coordinate with a new baby quilt. Enlarge one of the blocks to giant-size and add baby’s name and birth date using this free alphabet and numbers pattern. Then hang it in the nursery! This post tells you how to make a hanging sleeve, and this one tells you how to frame textiles.

Most applique patterns use a lot of smaller blocks – but you can super enlarge your favorite and use it as the center block of a medallion-style quilt. For this bunny quilt, the corner blocks are my usual 10 x 10 inches, and that center block is 30 x 30 inches.

Or maybe you want to make just one giant block! The center of this quilt is 40 x 50 inches and the borders are 5 inches wide. If you want to match your dog as closely as possible, I recommend the Playful Puppies and More Playful Puppies patterns. They’ve got loads of templates that you can mix and match to create almost any dog breed!

I’ve always thought it would be really fun to create a nap quilt for a child using the Paper Dolls pattern and sizing it to be the exact height of your kid! 🥰

There are so many possibilities! Get ready to have fun!

Tools & Supplies

For the most part, the tools and supplies you’ll need for giant applique are the same as what you’d use for any regular applique project – with just a couple of exceptions.

Printer

You won’t be able to print giant patterns on your regular printer – and tiling is impractical because the designs have lots of empty space, which makes assembling the tiles confusing. It works GREAT to save your designs to a flash drive and take them to your local print shop or office supply store. Near me, the Office Max, Staples, and Kinkos all have large printers that are inexpensive to use. There’ll be more info on how to enlarge your patterns in a later lesson, but for now just know that you’ll need access to a large printer.

Fusible Adhesive

Usually I use printable sheets of Heat & Bond Lite because I hate tracing and love the ease of printing out my templates all ready for fusing down. That’s not an option for giant applique, but luckily you can buy Heat & Bond Lite off the bolt at most fabric stores, including Joann Fabrics. It’s just 17″ wide, but you can buy pieces as long as you need. (We’ll cover what to do if your design is wider than 17″ in a later lesson.)

Thread

I like to outline my giant applique with thicker-than-usual thread, so that the outline is scaled up like the design itself. For that I use Sulky 12 wt. thread. It’s the thickest thread that can go through a regular machine. I use black for all my outlining, and a single spool has a lot of thread on it, so it lasts a LONG time. If you want a range of colors in the same weight, you can look for Sulky Petites, which are smaller spools.

To handle the thicker thread, you’ll also need a bigger needle. 90/14 topstitching needles are perfect for the Sulky 12 wt. thread.

There’s a post here with all the info you need about using thicker thread.

That’s it! All the other supplies are the same as for regular applique. You can find links to all my favorite tools and supplies here.

Here are links to all the Think BIG lessons. . .

• Intro and Tools and Supplies – a look some samples of projects made with giant applique, plus an overview of any special tools and supplies you’ll need
• Enlarging Your Pattern – how to figure out how big you’ll need it to be, and how to print giant template pieces
• Tips and Tricks for Giant Applique – what do you do if the pattern piece is bigger than your fusible adhesive, if it won’t fit on your ironing board, and how to scale up your outline stitching