Creating an ocean with fabric tiles – thoughts, tessellations, dreams and memories.
Many moons ago as a student, I had fun learning about, and experimenting with, tile pattern for my thesis. Using a new gadget called a computer and a plotter kind-of-thing the size of a small table (this was during the pre-computer age) I manipulated images to make patterns for tiles that could in theory be used by an everyday Joe to make his own decorative tiles. It was a revelation to me at the time that mathematics played such an important role in many art forms, not to mention nature and crystals in particular. Now, no, this experience didn’t make me love mathematics any more than usual BUT I did fall deeply in love with tessellations…or the simple version….the 17 possible ways that a pattern can be used to tile a flat surface without leaving a gap.
That’s what I worked with at the time but since then I have even bought books about tiles patterns and lust over photographs of Isfahan such as this….
Sheikh Lutfallah Mosque, Esfahan, (1602-1619)
Back to today, and me living on an island and being surrounded by the Aegean sea ….. and my dream of creating a fabric ocean. So, yes…..you guessed it. I decided to make fabric tiles that could be sewn together in different ways that would make my ocean. In fact tiles that could be used by anyone to make their own ocean.
It’s an ongoing experiment and I have created a few wall hangings, here are a few pics of what I have been doing for the last while.
More about tiles and geometry tomorrow!
Milos Crafts Design Studio 