Riley Blake Spook Alley - Downloadable PDF

Spook Alley Quilt Pattern by Jina Barney for Riley Blake Designs

The Spook Alley pattern is a free downloadable PDF quilt project designed by Jina Barney and published by Riley Blake Designs. This Halloween-themed quilt finishes at a generous 65" x 72", making it an ideal lap quilt or seasonal statement piece for a bed or sofa. Rated as a beginner-friendly project, it is an excellent introduction to structured border quilting while delivering a bold, festive result.

What Is Being Made

This pattern produces a single, large pieced quilt built around a central fabric panel and framed by five successive borders in coordinating fabrics. The design relies on the visual impact of the P2871 Purple panel fabric at its heart, surrounded by carefully measured strips of contrasting and complementary prints. The finished quilt is suitable for display during the Halloween season and is designed to showcase the Costume Clubhouse Collection from Riley Blake Designs.

Techniques Used

• Panel-centered quilt construction: The quilt begins with a pre-printed fabric panel cut to a precise rectangle, which serves as the focal point of the entire design.
• Successive border application: Five individual borders are added one at a time, working outward from the center. This technique, sometimes called straight-set borders, is one of the most fundamental skills in quilting and teaches accurate measuring and piecing.
• Measuring through the quilt center: The pattern specifically instructs quilters to measure through the center of the quilt before cutting each border, a best practice that prevents wavy or distorted edges caused by fabric stretch along the selvages.
• Sewing side borders first: Each border round follows the standard convention of attaching side borders before top and bottom borders, ensuring square corners and consistent dimensions.
• Quilt sandwich layering and binding: The finished quilt top is layered with batting and a backing fabric, then bound using a preferred Riley Blake fabric from the Costume Clubhouse Collection.

Stitches and Sewing Details

• ¼" seam allowance is used throughout the entire project, which is the standard seam allowance in quilting and is included in all measurements provided.
• All pieces are sewn with right sides together unless otherwise noted, following standard quilting convention.
• Strip piecing is used to join width-of-fabric (WOF) strips end-to-end to achieve the required border lengths.

Quilt Structure and Border Breakdown

The quilt is constructed from a central panel and five concentric borders, each adding depth, color contrast, and dimension to the finished piece:

• Quilt Center: One rectangle measuring 35½" x 42½" cut from the P2871 Purple panel fabric.
• Border 1: Cut from purple dot (C2875 Purple) in 3½"-wide strips — adds a soft, patterned frame directly around the panel.
• Border 2: Cut from licorice solid (C100-19 Licorice) in 1½"-wide strips — a narrow, dark accent border that creates sharp visual separation between the wider borders.
• Border 3: Cut from orange web (C2874 Orange) in 3½"-wide strips — introduces a bold Halloween-orange contrast that energizes the palette.
• Border 4: Again cut from licorice solid (C100-19 Licorice) in 1½"-wide strips — repeats the dark accent to frame the orange border cleanly.
• Border 5: The widest border, cut from purple main (C2870 Purple) in 7½"-wide strips — provides a substantial outer frame that anchors the entire composition and brings the quilt to its finished size.

Materials Required

This quilt is made entirely from woven quilting cotton fabrics, all drawn from the Costume Clubhouse Collection by Riley Blake Designs. No specialty materials are required. The recommended fabric quantities are: