Presenting Sparks

I'm still thinking about a new layout for the red/orange/yellow quilt I was ripping at the end of my previous post.  I think I have a solution.  It's not fabulous, but it's at least better than the original.

While I continue to ponder that, I thought you might like to see what the original design looks like when I don't mess up the colour values.  

None of the sparks disappear in this one!  I'm not sure there's as much color variation as I originally envisioned, but I still like it.  Subtle can work too :). The three prints are all from the Playful Posies collection from Island Batik.

The orange print is my favourite of the three.  

It was tricky to get a pretty styled photo showing all three fabrics.  This was the best I managed.  It's not very well styled!

This looks prettier but one of the prints is hidden.

After I finished the quilt and sent it to Island Batik to photograph for their fabric catalog,  I had to publish the pattern with this quilt on the cover.  This, of course, is when a design change occurred to me.  I think this is a stronger design:

What's a designer to do?  Include both in the final pattern, of course!  The tweak is super simple, just moving units around in the block construction, so fabric amounts are the same.  That worked out well!

I'd love to play around with a dark background, with shades of blue, or maybe blue and teal.  Or maybe blues at the top and bottom and a bright contrast in the middle?  So many options, so little time...  What would you try?

I'm off to play with the red/orange/yellow alternate layouts. 

Happy quilting,

Joanne

PS: Get your copy of Sparks in my Etsy shop now.