By now you might be quite familiar with the block in this week’s sketch! It’s appeared in the last two Sunday sketches (albeit with slight differences).

In the last two Sunday sketches, having the lines in the squares run horizontally and vertically meant that the block itself had to be laid out on point (just because of the way I’d originally designed it). But the slight tweaks this week mean that the block can be used in a standard layout (and made much more simply).

Instead of the outer edges of the block being a layer of rectangles connected by small corner squares, I replaced the corners with half-square triangles to create an octagonal border around the middle of the block. Then the blocks’ short sides can be butted up against one another.

I’ve used a four-colour palette; anything less, and you risk losing detail (because multiple elements need to be coloured the same and might blend into the background). The first version, above, shows that a larger palette also works, but I think it’s important then to use one consistent colour across the blocks to tie them together.

   

I tried tweaking things to put a bit of space between the blocks, but I don’t think this helps at all, and it would actually make the whole design a little more complicated to put together. So, I’m sharing it to show you my ideas but also to remind you that not all my ideas are necessarily good 🙂

Back to the better layout.

This week’s sketch would be a bit easier than the last few weeks’ to make into a quilt. All you’d need are squares, rectangles and half-square triangles. You wouldn’t assemble the blocks in full before piecing them together; you’d just make the middle square-in-a-square unit, the rectangle sides and the half-square triangle corners, and then assemble the whole quilt top in columns or rows. The blocks would only become whole once you’d pieced the entire top together. It would help to have a design wall where you could arrange everything beforehand, but if you’re fairly organised you could live without one (like I do).

I really like the multicolour version of this sketch, and I’m very tempted to make it!