Kismet Quilt Along: Layout

“Layout? Is the quilt along over? I thought it went for four weeks? I’m so confused.”

Never fear! To answer the questions that I know are flooding your brain right now, in order: yes layout, nope we’re not done yet, and yes there’s another week with tips to come. Why am I doing the layout before the very end? Most people do, it’s a tidy way to sum everything up and putting rows together is a cinch. But I want to talk to you about the aesthetic-artsy part of Kismet this week, not just the mechanics of putting blocks together. I want you to know which colors of blocks you need so you don’t wind up having to reverse-sew or with a ton of orphan blocks. It’ll save you time and a headache, trust me. So without further ado, let’s talk about color placement options aka your Color Horoscope!

Note that in the pictures below the white spaces are for blocks that I haven’t made yet. These are the spaces that I need to figure out what goes where.

Option No. 1: Colorwash

You’re the artsy piece/peacemaker, able to see the connections and the flow between even the most opposite of fabrics…This option most closely follows the layout of the original Kismet quilt. It’s like a color gradient but it radiates from a point rather than an orderly line. I start with the strong magenta (where the hot pink is in the original) and then move towards warmer colors in the upper right and cooler tones towards the bottom. The colors mesh a little better and it’s easier to use an odd number of blocks per fabric. This is especially useful if you’re using scraps or trying to make blocks out of something you can’t get more of.

Verdict: I need more of everything, particularly greens and yellows.

Option No. 2: Gradation

Your classic taste and clean lines shows your love of order, and you know how to get stunning results…This is probably the easiest for me to layout because I automatically go to rainbow order. Rainbow order is always popular, always looks good. There’s a reason why it’s still a thing! Start by grouping your blocks together in colors, not necessarily fabrics. You may have a great print that cuts up funny and the blocks look like different colors. Then, lay out your blocks in rows.

Verdict: I either need more green and possibly another color, or I need to move my layout down a row and go with more red-orange.

Option No. 3: 39 Block Pick Up

You embrace everyone and everything. Blocks feel at home with you. There is no such thing as an ugly fabric, just one that hasn’t found where it fits in this wide old Kismet quilting world…This is going to sound weird, but a purely scrappy mix-it-all-up layout is the hardest for me to feel happy about because there are no wrong choices. I’m weird, I know. Mix all your blocks up and move them around until they look balanced to you. For me, I try to keep the same fabrics from touching and even similar colors from being too close.

Verdict: I need more of everything, particularly the yellow and dark green because they’re so different from everything else. If I don’t make more, or at least an odd number of each, they’ll stick out and throw everything off.

So aside from the 11 blocks Original Kismet-ers or the 5 blocks Fierce Kismet-ers need to make, start thinking about how you want your overall quilt to flow. Which horoscope fits your aesthetic? Or do you have another idea entirely? There are lots of beautiful blocks on the Instagram feed, I can’t wait to see your quilts.