Goldilocks and the Floating Squares
This quilt started with a simple sketch of interlocking squares. I always use colored pencils for my sketches, and that medium naturally lends itself to playing with transparency. I’ve loved transparency quilts for years (no surprise, I’m also a fan of optical illusions), but this was my first time actually making one.
The early tests were… not promising. I began with a royal blue paired with grey and kept the squares the same width. It. Looked. Awful. Here is the photo proof (ugh). The colors were too intense, and the transparency effect just didn’t happen. I knew I needed lighter, softer colors to make the illusion work.
I pulled out my Kona color card and was immediately drawn to Summer Pear, a soft green that felt fresh and airy. I had just the right darker green in my resource center for the overlapping areas. With the colors sorted, I turned to proportions. The grey square worked as it was, so I kept it, but I needed to adjust the width of the green square. My first attempt was too thin, my second was too thick, and the third—right in the middle—was just right. Goldilocks wins again.
Construction was the next puzzle. My test blocks had been cut piece by piece, which meant a lot of chain piecing and plenty of room for small errors to build up. Back at the design software, I realized the blocks and sashing could be built entirely from strip sets. That one change made everything faster, cleaner, and more accurate.
Except… I still couldn’t get the seams to nest at all. I probably spent an unreasonable amount of time staring at my screen, trying to find a pressing path that would work. No matter what I did, one seam needed to go in both directions (and you know how I feel about pressing seams open). The breakthrough came with one simple change: breaking the large center 3" square in half so I could press that edge in both directions. Since the square is the same color, the seam is visually invisible. Suddenly, everything lined up, the seams fell into place, and I swear I heard angels singing. The blocks came together quickly after that.
For quilting, I used repeating concentric squares in the grey and green areas, letting the lines overlap in the transparent sections. I left the white areas unquilted, and to be honest, I’m not sure I’d make that choice again. They’re a little puffy compared to the tightly quilted squares, and the contrast catches my eye. But done is done, and I’m not about to pull out miles of stitching.
I love the airiness of this quilt, partly from the design itself and partly from the soft colors. And of course, Gracie was there throughout—moving from sunny spot to sunny spot while I worked. Her posing on photo day is getting better and better. At this point, she could be a professional model (a dogel?).
