Here’s another week’s worth of designs! I thought I’d talk a little more about the inspiration and design process for each one.

I’d really loved the way the Hummingbird Star had come together the day before, so I wanted to play around with stars again. When I made this spikey plant-style star, I thought it looked a bit like a Mariner’s Compass, so I expanded out the design to play with that. I really want to do a medallion quilt design at some point, but I think those might take more than 15 minutes. But this was an attempt to play with a center medallion. That many seams going into the center would be brutal, though.

Seriously, macarons again? I really liked my macaron design from a few days earlier (which got turned into a quilt top that I finished this week), so I wasn’t feeling terribly inspired by the photo. I started with a fairly similar shape to my previous design, but played around with stacking them on top of each other. This would probably be pretty fun as a scrappy quilt, and looks kind of like a sock motif.

One of the things I’ve learned about myself through the QDAD process is that I really like triangles. They are so dynamic and you can make so many shapes out of them. (There’s a reason that triangles are the basic building block for most 3D geometry in video games and computer graphics.) This started out as hexagons but ended up in this curved path. Hey look, surprise pop of color. That might come up a lot in future designs.

This would be terrible to piece, but I really love the design. It’d be really cool with lots of low volumes, with the pops of color. I mixed in the colors pretty deliberately, focusing the majority of the color with the reds, similar to how the white flowers look in the photo, with the color happening at their centers. The shape itself was chosen because it’s reminiscent of the flower stamens. (Pistil? Stamen? It’s been a long time since I’ve had biology.)

I really need to make this one. I’m fairly certain it could be done with a template similar to a drunkard’s path. Perhaps something close to the templates from the mod pop quilt pattern. I plan to do some testing, I just need to work up to dealing with all those curves. This is all done with circles over stripes. The earlier iterations were downright fugly, but with some persistence I ended up somewhere I really love.

I started out with the shape of the dessert, and knew I wanted to do something fun with the stripe of sauce. The grey stripe was a late addition, but I loved how it suddenly made the yellow shapes look like portholes into a bright and fun dimension. These colors were so much fun to work with!

So last week I made a comment about how dessert hues was the first of many low volume w/splashes of color. This would be the second of that series. This is very high on my list of quilts I want to make. The design took maybe 5 minutes, and yet it’s one of my favorites. Go figure!
38 thoughts on “Quilt Design a Day”
I like most of the designs you made. You play with colors really well but I wouldn’t like to piece them for sure 🙂 Nothing for an impatient kind.
Thanks Vera! I try not to think too much about the feasibility of making a design while I’m playing around because I found it was really hindering the creative process. But it’s been a while, and maybe it’s time to start thinking about it again. Because I really wouldn’t want to piece most of these either. 😉
These are great. It’s a great way to catalog all your ideas.
Thanks Rachel! It’s fun to go back and see the designs again after a bit of a break from them. 🙂
Amazing quilt designs. I would love to any of these quilts on my bed. I really like Desert Hues. It has an impact of simplicity and color. Since I love making quilts with curves, Tonal Blues would be a fun quilt to make. Thanks so much for sharing your process and your designs. Great job.
Thanks so much! If I could find the right colors, I’d be tempted to give Dessert Hues a try. 🙂 Maybe as a mini. Not that circles are exactly easier small, though… lol Tonal Blues would be a super fun one as well! I think maybe I should just start designing more of these as minis so I can try more of them. 🙂
love the dessert hues one!!
Thank you! 😀 I’m not sure there are fabrics bright enough to capture it, but I might have to go try to find them anyway. 😉
Oooh I love flora tones.
Thanks Sarah! I’m tempted to try making that one somehow. Maybe as a ticker tape quilt? Not sure that would have the effect I was after, though. But I’m really drawn to that style of design lately.
I want to make the underwater brights one! And agree the flora would be a nightmare to piece but it would be incredible!
If you make the underwater brights one, lemme know, I’d love to see it! 🙂 The flora one I imagine might be a little more bearable if done ticker tape style. But that loses the graphic nature of it. Might be kinda cool anyway, though. Maybe I’ll play around with a few methods of creating it and see if any of them are palatable!
Pigmented Palette IS GORGEOUS! and i was just thinking i would like a flying geese quilt, with ‘just enough’ geese. this would be fab. maybe THIS is the pattern i test! (; also – Flora Tones is also gorgeous…even tho, ya, that would take awhile (:
Pigmented Palette is one of the designs I am thinking of making next. 🙂 That style of greys + pops of color is really drawing my attention right now and it’d be fun to make. 🙂
Flora Tones – Yah…other than just sucking it up and making a ton of units, I’m not sure how to make that doable. Ticker tape is one thing I’ve been thinking but that would have a totally different feel to it.
I reply like your pigmented pallete design. Seems like you could make a bunch of flying geese using one of those techniques of making multiples at one time. Then toss in the 4 bright ones in the mix. This might be a quilt where the quilting could stand out.
Ohh that’s a great idea for construction on the pigmented palette. 🙂 I really love flying geese, but I’ve yet to make a quilt featuring them. And I’d definitely send it out to be quilted because I don’t think I could do it justice. 🙂
I finally need to weigh in and tell you how much I love this series and the designs you are coming up with! It sounds like such a fun exercise, and you’re developing some extraordinary designs! I *love* the desert hues one in this post–it’s just brilliant and you should absolutely put it on your list of quilt designs to make!
Wow, thanks so much, Casey! I appreciate you took the time to leave a comment. 🙂 It’s definitely been a [mostly] fun exercise! 😀 I will add dessert hues to my list to make! I am surprised at the reception it’s gotten so far. If I can manage to find colors that come close, I’ll go ahead and try making it. 🙂
You may have said this earlier (I recently started following your blog), but what program are you using to draw your designs?
Hi there! Thanks for following! 😀
I use Illustrator for these designs, because that’s the program I know. We have a group of people doing this daily challenge on Facebook and some of the others use EQ7, Inkscape, and sometimes just pen and paper. Some designs are easier to express with pen and paper, and some are easier with the computer. 🙂
Once again, I LOVE your designs! I keep telling myself that I am not allowed to buy anymore patterns (too many in my ‘to make’ pile already) but if you offered patterns for sale, I’d absolutely be buying! Dessert (couldn’t it be desert?) hues, pigmented palette, and underwater brights are so incredible. SO INCREDIBLE.
Wow, thanks so much Laura! I really appreciate your compliments! 😀 Some of these are more suited for patterns than others, but I’m hoping I’ll have some time coming up to devote to trying to make some actual patterns for download and/or purchase. 🙂
I’m loving seeing these designs. Thanks for sharing them, and keep going! They definitely inspire me. No time for me to do much quilting right now, but I can dream about it thanks to your fun designs 🙂
Thanks Erin! 🙂 I actually don’t have a lot of time for sewing lately, and doing these patterns keeps me from going stir crazy. It’s amazing what a difference 15 minutes of creative output can have on my overall mood!
Fantastic designs Anne! The dessert hues is *fabulous*! You know I love the pigmented palette — I may even have some gray ombre and a few saturated “scraps” to use if you were to do a QAL…..
Ooooh a grey ombre would be SO fun! 😀 I can’t imagine the design would take long to put together. It’d be lots of fun to see other people’s versions of it, too!
Wow, you are so talented! All of the designs appeal to me so much!
Thanks so much, Patti! 😀 I might need to start making a lot of mini-quilts so I can try out more of these designs!
Oh yes, that pigmented palette is perfect. Great hues and spacing. I also really like the flora tones.
Thanks so much! This particular batch of designs turned out well, which makes up for the weeks to come. LOL
Three of these are my favorites. Underwater brights, tonal blues, pigmented palette. Such great designs. Perhaps you should make one (or more) of them in mini–that seems to be going around the quilting world.
That is such an awesome idea! For some reason I was stuck on making these big. For some of them it feels justified, but for others, a mini is perfectly fine and would come together so much faster! Expect to see more minis in the near future. Thank you for the suggestion!
LOVE the portholes one. I want to make it!
I think I’ve convinced myself to try making that one as a mini. 🙂 Although maybe only one porthole for a mini… We’ll see. 🙂 If you make it, lemme know I’d love to see it!
Love love love the pigmented palette!
May I use it as inspiration for a quilt or do you have a pattern I could purchase?
Thanks so much! I don’t have a pattern made up for that (yet), but you’re welcome to use it as inspiration, especially if you give me credit for the inspiration. 🙂 I’d love to see what you make from it!!
i just came across your blog and haven’t been able to take my eyes off it. Such lovely designs 🙂
I love ‘dessert hues’ and ‘pigmented palette’. I am scared of piecing circles currently 🙁 But would definitely like to try ‘pigmented palette’. Would you be ok with me trying out this one on a quilt?
regards
Leena(India)
I blog at http://www.creativeinstincts.wordpress.com
Thank you so much for the kind words! 😀 And thank you for asking, feel free to make either of those designs. I’d love to see them if you do make them! If you post them anywhere, please can you credit me for the design. Thanks so much. 🙂