Card Trick Quilt Block — Cutting Chart for Any Size

4 fabrics · Difficulty 4 of 5

Card Trick is a 3×3 block of 28 pieces. Cut sizes for 6″, 9″, 12″, 15″, 18″ are below; for any other size it divides into cleanly, type the size and the chart recomputes.

At a glance

Grid

3×3

Pieces you cut

11 — subcutting turns them into the 28 in the sewn block

Difficulty

4 of 5 — experienced · How this is scored

Which sizes divide cleanly

Scroll sideways to see every column.

• A 5-patch block at 12″ would need 2.4″ units, which is not a mark on any ruler. Try 10″ or 12½″ instead — Sister's Choice is the 5-patch block on this site.
• A 7-patch block at 12″ would need 1.714…″ units, which is not a mark on any ruler. Try 10½″ or 14″ instead — Bear's Paw is the 7-patch block on this site.

More about the sizes that do not divide cleanly

The sizes in between

A 10″ Card Trick cannot be cut accurately on its 3×3 grid. Use 9″ or 10½″ instead; both cutting charts are on this page, computed by Quilt Block Atlas.

Both columns are FINISHED block sizes — the size a block will be once it is sewn, never a size to cut. Look the clean size up in the charts on this page for its cutting numbers.

Scroll sideways if the table is wider than your screen.

These sizes divide cleanly but sit between the main chart's columns — the same computed cuts, published here so they exist on paper too. Any other clean size still computes in the size input above.

Column headings are the FINISHED block size — the size it will be once it is sewn. Every number in the table is the size to CUT, which includes ¼″ of seam allowance on each edge. Rows that are subcut on a diagonal are cut larger still, so the allowance survives the extra cuts.

Scroll sideways to see every size.

About this block

Pieces in the finished block

28

Unit types

half-square-triangle unit, quarter-square-triangle unit

Divides cleanly at

1½″, 3″, 4½″, 6″, 7½″, 9″, 10½″, 12″, 13½″, 15″, 16½″, 18″, 19½″ and 21″ finished.

Also known as

Winning Hand

Attribution

Jeffrey Gutcheon, 1970s (McCall's Needlework and Crafts)

Fabric for one 12″ block

1½ yd total, rounded up to the nearest ⅛ yard, assuming 40″ of usable width.

No plain patch appears anywhere — every unit is pieced from triangles, and the centre unit alone holds a triangle of each card fabric plus the background. The weave only reads if each corner's fabric carries through the edge unit beside it, so lay the whole block out and confirm the interleave before joining anything.

Piecing order

1. Make the 4 half-square-triangle units.

2. Make the 5 quarter-square-triangle units.

3. Lay out row 1 of 3 and sew its pieces together, left to right.

4. Lay out row 2 of 3 and sew its pieces together, left to right.

5. Lay out row 3 of 3 and sew its pieces together, left to right.

6. Join the 3 rows, matching the seams.

Cutting oversize

The chart gives the standard cut sizes, nothing padded. Some quilters cut this block's triangle units a little oversize and trim back — published allowances genuinely disagree on how much, so the range with its sources is on how to square up a quilt block.

History

A modern block with a named designer: Jeffrey Gutcheon drew Card Trick in the 1970s and it ran in McCall's Needlework and Crafts; the Quilters Hall of Fame, which inducted Gutcheon in 1990, calls it a modern classic. Some sources sell it as Winning Hand. It has no Brackman number — the traditional indexes end where designer blocks begin — and the fanned-cards illusion gives the block its name.

Sources: MadamSew — Card Trick; Quilters Hall of Fame — Jeffrey Gutcheon.

Common questions

Published 2026-07-26 · Last updated 2026-08-15