More pinwheels this week, but I’ve gone back to the regular kind – made using half-square triangles rather than quarter-circles. I’m still using curves, just elsewhere in the design.

I’ve coloured the pinwheels the same across all blocks for consistency, but used two other colours per block. I added thin sashing between the blocks so they don’t touch; otherwise things were getting quite busy. But the diagonal lines still flow well, despite being interrupted slightly.

That colour palette and placement are bordering on a bit too much for me, but I like differentiating the two sets of four ‘petals’ per flower block. The blocks work in a single colour, although they’re maybe a bit less interesting. I guess it would depend on what palette you used?

I feel like using curves in this design mitigates the starkness of having all straight lines; they’re just a bit softer. Introducing curves into the pinwheels would’ve disrupted the diagonal lines completely, so that’s why I didn’t do that!

These designs are all fairly straightforward (which is probably my way of saying that even if you’re a beginner quilter, you are likely skilled enough to figure it out!). It’s just half-square triangles and quarter-circles (or drunkard’s path units). There are four half-square triangles per ‘type’ in each block (background + colour 1; colour 1 + colour 2), so you could use a four-at-a-time method for making the HSTs. (I prefer the eight-at-a-time method, because you don’t end up with bias edges. But that would mean either needing to rejig your colour placement or just ending up with extra HSTs.)

You could also try this design in an on-point layout, which gives an even more pinwheel-y feel. (Tilt your head 45 degrees and you’ll see what I mean.) The diagonal lines end up being horizontal and vertical, but there’s enough else going on in the design to keep things interesting.