New year, new sketch!

This design started out as something a bit more complicated, with some half-square triangles in there too. But I realised all the squares and rectangles were interesting enough on their own, so I pared it back.

Undoubtedly someone somewhere has designed something very like this. But I like playing with these sorts of designs anyway. My goal with this sketch was to use a standard layout of repeated blocks, but to colour every block differently using a palette of only three colours. Each block had to be coloured sensibly and symmetrically, with all four quadrants matching. I’m pretty sure all 16 blocks are uniquely coloured, but I haven’t checked with a fine-tooth comb 🙂

It’s a bit like Sunday sketch #310, where I coloured the same block differently to create an eye-catching, improv-y design. It’s a fun way to sketch without needing to design a brand new block (any one will do, as long as it has enough elements to enable multiple block variations).

Certain palettes give more of a transparency effect in some parts of the design, depending on the value and saturation of the colours.

In the next versions, the palette’s the same but the colour placement is different.

I find it hard to come up with interesting palettes featuring just three colours, so I often use the same combinations over and over again. Like bright pink, orange and white… or light pink, charcoal and off-white.

This week’s sketch is pretty straightforward, and would be easy to make into an actual quilt. It’s just squares and rectangles. The hardest part would be deciding what colour to put where (and then keeping track of the order once you start cutting and piecing!).