Composing Your Quilt Design

When you begin the process of designing a quilt, you're actually beginning a composition and compositions are the same whether you're composing a new piece of music or a new piece of artwork. What you need to do is you need to use some very important tools to make that composition come out in a way that's pleasing to the eye. One of the most easy ways, is to use what's called the golden mean rectangle to set up your design field. And your design field is basically, the size of your finished piece. The golden mean rectangle is simply a rectangle that has the long side 1.618 times larger or longer than the short side.

And that's pretty easy to figure out. If you have a 10 inch short side, you'd have about a 16 inch long side. So it's always a rectangle. Rectangles are very pleasing to the eye and humans like to look at them. So here with this composition, I started with a square and here we have half square triangles that are put together into a larger square, that actually the way their pieced has a square inside a square inside a square and so on.

When I was done I knew that I wanted to elongate it so I added the sections that I could put the applicay in and that formed a rectangle. I also wanted to repeat some of the elements that were already present. So I added squares in this inner border to repeat the squares that were here. And then I added an outer border and repeated the leaves and the outer border quilting that are also present in the applicay. So when you're composing, what you're doing is you're creating a visual for the viewer to see that is pleasing, using balance, using repeat and harmony.

Our next piece is relying on the rule of thirds. It too is a golden mean rectangle. The short side is 1.618 shorter than the long side. When we look at it, we can visually divide it long wise in thirds. And one third ends about right here and the other about right here.

This is our focal point, and you want your focal point to be sitting on one of those lines that shows the third of the quilt or the artwork. So here we have a very pleasing setup. If we were to have put this in the middle, it would have looked more like a bullseye. If we put it too far off to the side, it would look like it's falling off and not a part of the piece. So try to remember the rule of thirds and put your focal point so that it's lying on one of those thirds.

Our next piece has asymmetrical balance. It too is a golden mean rectangle. The balance is asymmetrical because it has a heavier focal point in one area. It is balanced however, with a lighter focal point in another area and those are balancing on the diagonal. We've done a lot of repeat here.

We've added a very shiny fabric to repeat the shiny paint. We also have this wonderful L that is supporting the lower portion and a smaller L that's supporting the upper portion. We're repeating the shapes. We have flowers and flowers, small flowers, small flowers, cherries, cherries, and leaves repeated also. And we're working in odd numbers rather than even numbers because odd numbers are more pleasing to the eye.

Here we have a cluster of three flowers and here just one. Working in a square format is one of the hardest things to do unless you're doing a radial design and a radial design has a focal point that's in the center and then moves out across the surface. As you can see here, this does not have a radial design. So what I've tried to do is to balance the different focal points. Basically each one of these flowers acts as a focal point.

It gets everybody's attention. But this is the largest and so it has the most physical weight. So I put it at the bottom. It's being balanced on the diagonal with this second largest flower. And then these two balance each other on the diagonal as do these two.

I chose a background fabric that repeats the colors that are inside the blocks that added harmony. But then I really wanted a kicker to add some interest. So I picked up the red orange that was inside the flowers and bordered all of the blocks with that. I also brought that out to the outside edge when I finished and couched a fiber along the binding. This quilt is also almost a square.

It's a little bit longer than it is wide. The piece inside is a square but it has lots of other geometrical figures on it. We've got circles or portions of circles, a long L, some squares and rectangles. The fact that they're very geometric, plays nicely off of this very kind of ethereal look that's also present. So we have a nice contrast of shapes and forms.

We're repeating the color of this intense L with a background fabric to add interest and to keep it harmonious. And then finishing off with violet by bringing the violet that's in the center of the piece out to the outside edge, creating unity. This piece is a rectangle but it's not a golden mean rectangle. It does have one golden mean rectangle on it however. We're also using the L for balance so it has this weight here, that is balanced off by these three shapes on the opposite side.

It's just got two colors in it, red violet and yellow green. They're direct compliments, and so they add a lot of contrast. These shapes aren't very interesting. I wasn't putting them there for interest. I was putting them there to repeat the color.

I wanted this flower up here in the corner to really get shown off. So I wanted to make sure I spread that red violet around. The fact that this flower is so easy to see, helps you see all the rest of the flowers in the quilting. And for me, that's what this piece was all about. Now our last piece uses another term and this term is Fibonacci sequencing.

Here we have stars of all different sizes but we're repeating a growth pattern. Fibonacci sequencing is a growth pattern. It's present in the human body and it's present in architecture. It is a growth pattern that grows by addition, if you start with a number one and add one and one together, you get two. And if you add one and two together you get three and add two and three, you get five and three and five you get eight and five and eight you get 13 and so on.

So here what I've done is I've used that mathematical equation in the sizes of my stars. So I have stars that are growing. This is a two-inch star, a three inch star, a five inch star and an eight inch star. What happens when you use this mathematical equation is that there's a nice, smooth melody or rhythm in the growth of the shapes or forms that you're using. I hope that you take this information the next time that you're considering creating your own unique piece of artwork or quilt.

And that you can remember it and use it so that you can make something that's very harmonious and pleasing to the eye.