Size Matters

See this chessboard? It is one of the forty I made about eighteen years ago after my son learned chess at college, came home one weekend and asked if I could make him a chessboard. (Well, duh!)

My son took photos of me making the very first one and the photo I use in my blog's header, above.

Pretty sure I've told this story before. I made one, thought it was okay, then made another and improved on the first. Made a third that was much improved, made another one because I wanted one for myself in pretty colors and then had so much fun with them I kept going. (I called them "a symphony in four fabrics.")

Somebody asked a good question the other day, if I would change the quantity of the stripes in these big blocks. Answer = No.

I am sure you are wondering WHY. The size of the rows of this block (2-1/4") is for a very specific reason. When I made the first chessboard for my son, I did a bit of research. It turns out the size of the squares on a chessboard is directly related to the size of the chess pieces. (You can look it up.) 2-1/4" squares were most common. So I made the chessboards with 2-1/4" squares.

 And when I made the chessboard quilt, I used the leftover strip sets. I didn't get all worked up about how I put the blocks together (it was a SCRAP quilt).

I didn't get all worked up about how the blocks went together either. Then as now, I sewed about a third of my triangles into blocks, played with them on the floor, and then cut and sewed blocks I'd need to fit any space I had (a left leaning block with a dark stripe on the bottom).

I didn't get very worked up about how the blocks worked together, and if I had stripes that went across several triangles, that was fine by me. This quilt is big, about 76" x 94" and it is long gone. It is also tied and not quilted, but it lives in the southern US so it's perfect.

I always liked the quilt's inherent rhythm, the size of the blocks and the strips across, so when I resurrected this idea seventeen years later, I kept those basic "design bones."



And yes, I am working on the tutorial for these "Zebra" quilts. It's taking longer than I expected, but then, the world has thrown us all for a hell of a loop.