Sunday, March 10, 2013

Back on the design horse

I am desperate to finish one of my tops that has been in rather large pieces for weeks/months now.  In all honesty, I have 3 quilts in this state, and have a horrible itch to start another.  I refuse to start one, however, until I get 2 of them into completed flimsies.  I have shown this before I think.  For a while now, it has been the prevailing plan/design.  Note that all 4 outer mosaic borders will be like the upper left .
 So yesterday I started stitching the striped corner sections to the peachy center square.  They are being a little persnickitty but I think I can make them work OK.  I have thought all along that the addition of the of the brown square on point (it's not really a square) had made the design palatable to my taste.  It does help to define a bold shape, equal in intensity to the peach square.   My mistake came when I decided to rotate the center section that I had pieced to date...
It went from this (above) to this (below)...
I happen to like aspects of the rotated design...I like the peach focal on point.  I like the original design when it comes to the center - my eyes likes the gold center square on point, but get confused when I see the big peach square.  The trick is redesigning the remainder of the quilt to use the outer florette corners that I already have made, and NOT making the overall footprint of the quilt much larger than the original 68" I had designed.  Too many design criteria~!  I have puttered with how I'd make the rotated version work with regards to the remaining borders. Fortunately I have plenty of the gold fabrics.  And remember that the above concept will still have the black outer border with the mosaic shown in the top picture (EQ7 rendition).  I may even add in the brown faux square (only showed the triangle at the top border).

Does anyone have thoughts?  I hope to work on this later this week and next weekend but hate to feel conflicted and uncertain which design has the most punch.  When you look at each layout, what do you see? What do you want to see?  ...the center square or the peachy square?  Does your eye prefer it square or on point?

...or am I just neurotic :-)

5 comments:

Susan Lawson said...

I don't know if it's just the picture (last pic) the border appears "rounded" like an optical illusion and brings the center medallion more into visual focus. kinda cool....

Vicki W said...

I like the way you rotated the center and I also like the brown square at the top corner.

Virginia said...

If you can make it work I prefer the bottom layout with the brown triangle added. Either way, it is a fabulous design.

Tami @ Lemon Tree Tales said...

I think there's more movement to the first version than the second one. The peach square doesn't bother me and I bet it looks pretty in person as compared to what it looks like represented in the computer program.

BTW I took my first FMQ class last week and when we were talking about the Shout color catcher I mentioned your experience with it and how it saved your beautiful quilt. Everyone loved the tip.

Anonymous said...

Hello,

Congratulations on your latest ribbon. That would have to be one of my favourite quilts that you have made.
I also can't wait to see how your pink and green does when you start entering it.

Rebecca