Two jelly roll strips make one whole block. Not one unit, not one row. The entire Bento Box, cut from two strips of the same pair of fabrics, which is about as economical as a block that looks this intricate ever gets.
Jean Lorraine names the block before she cuts anything. It comes from the Japanese lunch box with its divided compartments, and she puts it in the log cabin family, which is exactly where the construction lands. Each quarter of the block is built the way a log cabin is built, out from a small center, light on one side and dark on the other. Four of those quarters turned against each other are what produce the interlocking lattice that gives the block its name. She teaches two routes to it, one from a jelly roll and one from yardage, and they are not the same method with different measurements.
From the jelly roll, each of the two fabrics gives four 2 and 1/2 inch squares, four 2 and 1/2 by 4 and 1/2 inch rectangles, and a 2 and 1/2 by 6 and 1/2. That is the whole cutting list. Two of the four quarters are built one way and two are built mirrored, then they go together like a four patch with the center squares set opposite one another. Press everything toward the dark and the seams nest on their own.
The video went up in August 2026 and has passed 34,000 views on a channel of 23,900 subscribers.
The yardage route is the reason to stay past the halfway mark. Instead of building four quarters, you build two complete courthouse steps blocks with opposite centers, then cut each one straight down the middle in both directions and swap the quadrants between them. Same finished block, opposite logic, and watching both back to back is the clearest explanation of why the design works that you are likely to find.
She quilts each block before squaring it to 12 and 1/2 inches, which is the quilt as you go method. If you want that written out in full, we wrote it in our complete guide to quilt as you go.
The rest of Jean's tutorials are on her channel at My Quilt Room.
