Your Heart Will Flutter With These 15 Sweet And Sassy Butterfly Quilt Patterns

When searching for your next quilt pattern, you may want to find something unique, and what would be more memorable than a butterfly-themed quilt pattern?

You wouldn’t think there are many butterfly quilt patterns on the market, but there are!

Butterflies are one of those insects that, no matter how old you are, when you see one, you have to stop what you’re doing and admire their beauty.

The same goes for butterfly-covered quilts, so let’s chat about these beautiful, eye-catching quilt patterns without further ado. 

What Is a Butterfly Quilt? 

A butterfly quilt can be defined as a quilt top with one large butterfly motif for the centerpiece or a quilt with smaller butterfly blocks for the overall design.

You could even call a quilt that uses butterfly fabric a butterfly quilt, but usually, it has to do with the quilt design rather than the material used. 

There are many ways to make a butterfly quilt, such as applique, patchwork, English paper piecing, or even improv quilting. 

How to Make a Butterfly Quilt Block

I have designed a butterfly quilt block, especially for this blog post I want to share with you. You can use this quilt block to create an entire quilt top or include it with other blocks to make a fun mix-n-match design. 

The finished size of the block is 9” and is pieced using traditional piecing methods. Here is the list of pieces you will need for one block:

Background fabric

• 4- 5”x2 ¾” rectangles
• 4- 2 ¾”x4 ¾” rectangles
• 1- 2 ¾”x1” rectangle
• 1- 1 ¼”x1” rectangle

Body fabric

• 1- 6 ½”x1” rectangle

Large wing fabric

• 2- 5”x4 ¾” rectangles
• 2- 2 ¾”x4 ¾” rectangles

Small wing fabric

• 2- 2 ¾”x3 ¼” rectangles

After you cut the pieces necessary for your blocks, follow these steps to piece your beautiful butterfly blocks together. 

Step 1: Sew Block A

• You will need 2- Block A pieces
• For each Block A, you will need:
  • 1- 5”x4 ¾” from the large wing fabric
  • 2-  5”x2 ¾” from the background fabric
• Block A is pieced just like a flying geese block. Lay one background piece right sides together with the wing fabric. Sew from the top left corner of the background piece to the bottom right corner.

• Trim the excess fabric to the right of the seam. Leave ¼” seam allowance. Press the seam open.

• Repeat this step on the other side.

• Create two Block A pieces.

Step 2: Sew Block B

• You will need 2 Block B pieces
• For each Block B, you will need:
  • 1- 2 ¾”x4 ¾” from large wing fabric
  • 1- 2 ¾”x4 ¾” from the background fabric
• Place the rectangles right sides together and sew from the top left corner to the bottom right corner. 

• Trim the excess fabric and press the seam open.

• Create two Block B pieces

Step 3: Sew Block C

• You will need 2 Block C pieces
• For each Block C, you will need:
  • 1- 2 ¾”x3 ¼” from small wing fabric
  • 1- 2 ¾”x4 ¾” from the background fabric
• Place the rectangles right sides together and sew from the top right corner to the bottom left corner of the small wing fabric. 

• Trim the excess fabric and press the seam open.

• Create two Block C Pieces

Step 4: Sew Block D

• You will need 1 Block D piece
• For each Block D, you will need:
  • 1- 6 ½”x1” from the body fabric
  • 1- 1- 2 ¾”x1” from the background fabric
  • 1- 1 ¼”x1” from the background fabric
• Sew the three pieces together with the body fabric in the middle.

Step 5: Sew all the pieces together to create the block

Here is what a quilt top could look like if you used our free butterfly quilt block.

Butterfly Quilt Pattern: 15 Sweet and Sassy Patterns

Now that we’ve gone over the basics of a butterfly quilt and you learned how to make a simple butterfly quilt block, I want to show you some gorgeous patterns that are sure to make you say, “Wow!” I did try to find a good mix of paid and free butterfly quilt patterns to fit everyone’s budget. 

1. Social Butterfly

Here is a beautiful pattern by Vanessa Goertzen that shows how to make a 75”x75” quilt top. You could easily create any size quilt by making as many butterfly blocks as you need for a specific quilt size.

The design is fun since you can mix and match fabrics and colors to create a unique patchwork-style butterfly quilt. The pattern is fat quarter and beginner-friendly.

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2. Fluttering By

“Fluttering By” is a gorgeous machine applique quilt pattern that features a wide variety of butterfly sizes and shapes to make this breath-taking quilt top.

The designer wrote step-by-step instructions for a 66”x82” quilt, but you could use a larger or smaller background fabric to make the size quilt you need.

You can see in the example quilt what a difference free-motion quilting can make to the overall design of a quilt with a lot of “blank space.” This quilt is stunning.

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3. Lepidoptera

Elizabeth Hartman is known for her easy-to-follow, beautiful quilt patterns. She includes several sizes and shapes of traditional pieced butterflies to choose from and made this pattern with fat-quarters in mind. You can use yardage if you prefer to select your coordinating fabrics. 

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4. Vintage Hankie Butterfly Block

Here is a free tutorial from Victoriana Quilt Designs that features vintage handkerchiefs in the design. The finished size of the blocks measures 12’x12. The designer does a wonderful job of showing each step with photos and written instructions.

Antique stores are a great place to find if you don’t have handkerchiefs.

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5. Butterflies Pattern

Edyta Sitar from Laundry Basket Quilts created this beautiful applique pattern. The pattern includes all necessary templates and instructions to make this 48”x57 ½” quilt.

You can use fat quarters for this design or do as the designer did for this example quilt and use a scrappy selection of fabrics. If you want to make a smaller or larger quilt, you can add or subtract butterfly blocks to get the size you want. 

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6. Butterfly Effect

Wow, this pattern is drop-dead gorgeous! This English Paper Piecing (EPP) pattern will show you how to make a 24” block pictured above. You can create a mini quilt with just one block or create more blocks to make a larger quilt.

The designer doesn’t give complete instructions on EPP, but she does state that this pattern is EPP beginner-friendly. She has all kinds of resources available in the description for inspiration and tips and tricks. 

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7. Scrappy Butterfly Block

These adorable scrappy butterfly quilt blocks were made by Joanne from Canuck Quilter Designs. She has created an easy-to-follow free tutorial for making these fun blocks using scraps.

The finished blocks measure 12”x12” and can be used to create an entire quilt top, or you can use them with blocks to make a cute Spring-inspired quilt. 

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8. Caroline the Butterfly

Candy and Faith from Quilt Vine created this adorable purple butterfly. I could not find the pattern they designed to go along with this quilt, but their blog post gives brief instructions on how they created it.

They drew the butterfly outline on the background fabric and then cut pieces to fit within the outline. They then machine stitched each piece, exposing the raw edges to add some texture to the design. The finished quilt measures 48”x40”.

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9. Butterflies by The Pattern Basket

A beautiful, sweet butterfly quilt pattern is suitable for all skill levels. This pattern is layer cake and fat-quarter friendly. The pattern calls for 20 butterfly blocks, but you can make more or less depending on the size of quilt you want to make.

The finished size of the pattern quilt is 46 ½”x47”.

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10. Butterfly Quilt Block

Here is another free quilt block pattern for you. This quilt block is from a series by Polka Dot Chair, and all you have to do to get the free pattern is sign up with your email to get the entire series of free patterns.

This block measures 10” and can be used with other 10” blocks to make a fun sampler quilt. 

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11. Butterfly Dance

“Butterfly Dance” is another sweet, fun pattern that shows you how to make a traditional pieced quilt block. This quilt has an on-point layout, and the pattern gives complete instructions for laying out and piece. The finished size of this quilt is 58 ½”x72”.

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12. The Butterfly Quilt

If you are looking for a next-level butterfly quilt pattern, look no further. This gorgeous pattern is a sampler quilt with a giant butterfly centerpiece to showcase the different traditional pieced blocks.

The finished measurements of this quilt are 88”x94”, but if you want to make it large enough for a king bed, you can add some decorative borders to get it to the correct size.

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13. Baby Butterfly Patch

Here is a perfect example of using simple squares and half-square triangles and making a beautiful quilt. This quilt will be ideal if you want a quick, easy project. This would make a great beginner quilt project and can be easily adjusted to make any size quilt just by changing the size of the squares. 

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14. Whimsical Butterflies

Here is a unique pattern that offers instructions on making these beautiful applique butterflies and includes files for embroidering the edges if you are lucky enough to have an embroidery machine.

If you don’t have one, don’t worry, you can use a zig-zag stitch for the raw edges and other decorative stitches for the detail work.

The pattern has instructions for several different size blocks and how to use the blocks to make a table runner.

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15. Butterfly Dreams

As soon as I saw this quilt, I knew I had to show it to you! How amazing is this design? This EPP quilt pattern will show you how to make this large-scale butterfly block.

The minimum finished size is 82”x64”, making this block perfect for a queen or king-size quilt. The designer states this pattern is beginner-friendly, and there are no “Y” seams.

I hope you enjoyed this collection of beautiful butterfly quilt patterns. It amazes me how a small creature can inspire many quilt designers to create these gorgeous interpretations of how they see a butterfly. 

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