Arrowhead

 

There are similar block patterns from the mid- to late-1800’s, but I believe the first block with this name and look was published in 1941. I suspect that pattern was a series of printed templates the reader was expected to trace and use to hand-cut (with scissors) bits of fabric before sewing them together. In 2011, Anita Grossman Solomon published a simplified method for constructing this block in Quiltmaker Magazine. Anita’s idea was to stack two pieces of fabric and then rotary-cut them in half, diagonally, twice. Then, each triangular piece would be sliced two more times and the colors swapped to create the finished design. I didn’t use a pattern for this block. Instead, I started with two 11” squares of cotton and ended up with two identical 8” finished blocks. I’ve got plenty of civil war reproduction scraps to play with, and I suspect when I’m done, all my blocks will nest together.