Here’s an easy way to have a little design fun. Choose a simple 6″ block that has a strong diagonal, and make it in 2 high contrast fabrics. The possibilities will be even greater if you make positive and negative versions of the block. These are the 2 blocks I started with:
I made 24 blocks – 12 light and 12 dark.
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Now the fun begins. Let’s start with the blocks set side by side and in the same orientation. I’ve put all the darker blocks in the arrangement on the left and all the lighter ones on the right.
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Sweet, but not very exciting. Let’s try alternating the dark and light blocks while still keeping them in the same orientation:
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Now we’re getting somewhere….but what if we divided the darks and lights up once again and butted the 2 halves together….while turning every other block?
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Now let’s go a bit crazy!
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At this point I think I need to double the number of blocks and try playing a little more with the symmetry:
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That’s my favorite so far! Here are a few more I came up with:
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Sew many options!
To help in my decision making I took a picture each time I tried something new and then pasted them onto a page on my computer screen to compare them all and glean out the best (I didn’t show the klinkers :-). That’s where I got the idea for this post.
Any block with a strong diagonal can be played with in a similar fashion. Have you used similar blocks in a unique set? If so, please send pictures!
Sandi says
I love blocks with strong light/dark diagonals! My latest is the Birds in the Air quilt I’m in the process of quilting. You can see it here:
http://piecemealquilts.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/progress-report/
clkquilt says
Beautiful! Thanks for sharing the link!
Julia R says
I share in your favorite, it’s mine too. Thanks for sharing, will have to try this.
Johanna says
Chris,
This is one of my favorite things to do in EQ7. I have used this simple block when we did a BOM exchange at guild and got 24 possible layouts with the touch of a button. I am happy to post some of your block done like this as TIFFs or GIF if you like.