Although I’m not planning on submitting anything to the Transparency Quilting Challenge at QuiltCon 2025, this concept seems to have influenced a few of my designs lately.

The Modern Quilt Guild describes transparency as “a visual illusion – an implied sense of transparency created by the combination of fabrics that makes them appear as though they are overlapping and blending into one another.”

Obviously you want to use colours that make sense in the overlapping areas, although that doesn’t necessarily mean they have to be the exact colours you’d expect. For example, many of the colours I used in the multicoloured version of Sunday sketch #146 are ‘wrong’ (you don’t get hot pink from overlaying pale pink and acid yellow), but I still think they give a reasonable impression of transparency.

But anyway… transparency gives you lots of scope for playing with colour, which is always fun!

I started with my usual favourite combo of yellow, pink and orangey-red, but this design works in just two colours too (discounting the background colour for now…). The dark pink squares in the first version below are probably a smidge too dark, but I think your first instinct is to consider those squares as overlapping areas, which I guess is the point.

Removing the transparency changes the design in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. In the case of a blue and orange palette, I think the darker squares (where zigzagging lines overlapped) helped to anchor the design in some way; without them, the criss-crossed, accordion-like stretches seem to take on a lot more movement and energy. I guess it’s because the eye is just drawn to different areas now. The reverse colourways feel quite different to each other, too.

Regardless of which version you wanted to make into an actual quilt, the construction process would be much the same: a lot of small squares set on point. I think there’d be a way to make the design from a small series of four-patch blocks (maybe no more than four types? I haven’t looked closely…), but I’m not sure that would save much time in the long run. I’d be more tempted to just make long columns of squares (with the occasional rectangle), add setting triangles at the ends, then join them up.

I’m really looking forward to seeing what quilts are juried into the Quilting Challenge at QuiltCon 2025 in Phoenix. Submissions are open from September 1 to October 31, 2024, so you still have plenty of time! 🙂