Tagged: square

Sunday sketch #386

It took me ages to decide which version to show you first today, and I’m still second-guessing myself. I love all of this week’s sketches!

The fundamental design of this week’s sketch is the same as last week’s, but the blocks are set in a standard layout instead of on point. And I’ve changed the colouring to emphasise a different shape – the dark blue shapes that combine to form a lovely curvy four-pointed background to each flower (which in turn combine to create a lovely scalloped edge to the whole design). Can you see them? (In the bottom right image, below, they’re in white instead of dark blue.)

I like this multicolour palette – so bright and happy! – but I prefer the alternating colour/white flowers of the first version, which let your eye rest a bit while maintaining the repetition of the flower blocks.

Different parts of the design can be coloured to move the emphasis around – in the next version, I’ve added another layer of squares to the edges of the design, which I think helps bring them to the foreground.

Similarly, removing other elements helps to emphasise those curvy shapes. Here are a few versions where I’ve eliminated more and more bits.

The design also works with a simpler palette. In both versions below, I’ve used a lighter colour for the background and a darker colour for the squares and diamonds, but I think the reverse would work just as well.

This week’s sketch could be made into a quilt using mostly quarter-circle (or drunkard’s path) units. Some of the versions shown here would also require a small number of squares and/or rectangles.

Sunday sketch #384

If you’ve followed my Sunday sketches for awhile, you’ll know that I love playing with colour palette and placement to make multiple versions of the same block. This week’s design uses two blocks, but that just creates more opportunities!

In the first version I’m showing you, which is the last iteration of the underlying design, I’ve just used colour to hide parts of the block (by blending them into the background). This particular colour placement suggests that the blocks have two layers, each of which can be peeled back to reveal the other one on its own. (This is my attempt at ‘modernising’ what’s otherwise a relatively traditional design.)

The designs that led to that first one are a bit different, though. I started by alternating two block types in a standard layout (even though the diagonal lines in the next few versions might suggest an on-point layout). Even with two relatively simple block designs, there are loads of ways to use colour placement to achieve a different look. Sometimes that means colouring some shapes the same as the background, effectively removing them from the design.

After playing with those versions for awhile, I switched to an on-point layout, which changes all those diagonals to vertical or horizontal lines. The same two block types are in there, but it almost looks like a design you could achieve using just one block type and some creative sashing.

I often like to colour only some of the outer blocks to create interesting edges to my designs. (I really like the movement in the first design below, which I think might be easier to see when there’s no red to distract the eye.)

Of course, I kept iterating these designs and adding or subtracting new shapes (which were always there, just not always coloured in). This next version, the penultimate one, is the first version where I coloured in those smaller red squares (which are actually the four corners of that particular block; the other block doesn’t have any red in it).

This colour placement suggests two discrete layers: a lacework of red squares overlaying the black ones. I liked the idea of paring back both layers in different areas, to reveal each one on its own (at least for a few blocks). That’s a concept I’d like to explore more in future.

Anyway, so the first and last sketches in this week’s post feel a bit different from the rest of the designs – I probably could’ve stretched them out to fill two blog posts! – but at least you can see how they’re all connected.

This week’s designs could be made into quilts using squares, square-within-a-square units, flying geese, rectangles and half-square triangles.