Needlecrafts Quilting Quilting Patterns

Easy Maple Leaf Quilt Block Pattern

Maple leaf pattern

Janet Wickell / The Spruce

This Maple Leaf quilt block pattern was originally used during a quilt block exchange. Quilters sewed the leaves in fall colors of red, orange, or yellow and placed the colorful patches against a light blue background.

Choose Fabrics

Alter the colors in any way you like. You could make a wallhanging with quilt blocks that represent maple leaves as they change during every season of the year or forget about natural colors and use any fabrics that suit your decor.

Maple Leaf blocks look lovely sewn with batik fabrics.

  • Finished maple leaf quilt blocks: 9" x 9"

Quilting Fabrics for One Maple Leaf Block

Light or medium-blue tone-on-tone sky background fabric:

  • One 3-1/2" x 3-1/2" square
  • Two 3-7/8" x 3-7/8" squares
  • Two 3-1/8" x 3-1/8" squares

From red, orange or yellow tone-on-tone leaf fabric:

  • Four 3-1/2" x 3-1/2" squares
  • Two 3-7/8" x 3-7/8" squares

Increase the size of squares that end in 7/8" (used for half-square triangle units) to make oversize units and then trim them back to 3-1/2" square after assembly.

You could also try the Magic 8 half square triangle method to sew eight identical units at the same time.

Assembly

Assemble the Maple Leaf's stem with the same easy quick piecing technique that's often used to sew snowball quilt blocks.

It's an extra step but pressing to set a seam before pressing the seam to one side nearly always improves accuracy.

  1. Select a 3-1/2" inch square of leaf fabric and the 3-1/8 inch squares of sky fabric.
  2. Draw a diagonal line from one corner to the opposite corner on the reverse side of each sky square. Lay a smaller sky square on top of the larger square, right sides together and edges aligned in one corner.
  3. Sew a seam on the diagonal line. Trim the excess to the right of the smaller square, leaving about 1/4" for a seam allowance. Flip the sky fabric upright and press the seam allowance towards the sky triangle.
  4. Repeat to sew another small sky square to the opposite side of the leaf square. The new patchwork unit will look like the left drawing's bottom right square. 
  5. Use another quick piecing technique to make four half-square-triangle units from the 3-7/8" squares, pairing a sky square with a leaf square. The finished units should measure 3-1/2" square. 
  6. Arrange the stem, half square triangle square units, and plain squares into three rows as shown in the left drawing at the bottom of the image.
  7. Sew the components of each row together, and then press seam allowances in adjoining rows in opposite directions.
  8. Sew the rows together, matching seam intersections. Press.
  9. The quilt block should measure 9-1/2" x 9-1/2".
  10. Repeat to make additional Maple Leaf quilt blocks.