This week’s design started on my sketchpad. I often doodle half-square triangles or parallelograms, and I began with a shape I’ve used before – overlapping parallelograms that create little cat ears poking out the top (I used something similar in Sunday sketches #114 and #160). I’d never really done much with just that shape though, so I decided to keep working on it. I knew if I wanted to play with colour or transparency, I’d have to recreate the shape in EQ8. So I did.

This design actually started out a little differently… I began with a looser arrangement. The same elements were all there, but the blocks were wider and longer, leaving more negative space.

As always, I’m never completely sure which version I like best. I think in this case, the tighter version with less negative space wins out. I’m not sure why. Maybe because it brings those white squares (on point) a bit closer together and makes them more obvious, which adds another interesting element to the design.

Each design could be translated into a quilt pattern using squares, rectangles, half-square triangles and quarter-square triangles.