It’s been a couple of months since I posted a hand-drawn sketch. I’ve been sketching less lately. Often I start with a dot pad and quickly move to EQ8 when I’ve decided on a motif that I want to explore further. Other times, it’s just easier to start with EQ8. Hand-sketching can require a level of concentration and thought that I don’t always have. But of course, concentration and thought take practice, and they’re easy to lose if you don’t nurture them with time and attention. A gentle reminder to myself that I should make time to sketch, even when there seem to be easier alternatives.

Anyway…! Here’s what I was working on when I last opened my dot pad.

I’ve explored this idea of ‘folded ribbons’ before – see Sunday sketches #74, #75 and #76, for example – and it’s the sort of thing that could spark a thousand more designs. But this time, I wanted to play with the idea of the ‘folded’ bit being a feature, creating its own path.

I ended up designing quite a few variations, with different canvas shapes (square-ish above; rectangular-ish, below), or numbers of lines in each group, or proximity of lines.

Imagine using a really bold print for those lines in the foreground. Wouldn’t that pack a punch?

I’m still working through this idea in my head and on paper, so I may have more of these to show you sometime soon (assuming another design idea doesn’t grab my attention in the meantime!).

This design could be translated into a quilt pattern using long strips (and some careful cutting to maintain the proper angles) or even a lot of triangles.