I’m making a quilt and have a specific style in mind, but the layout is driving me nuts. For some reason, I can’t get the pattern down.
There are six different fabric (A, B, C, D, E, F) in a large size, then there smaller pieces of the same fabric (a, b, c, d, e, f). In one row, I need six large pieces and three small pieces, so nine fabric pieces per row. The large pieces (ABCDEF) will always be in the same order, but the smaller pieces need to be mixed in somewhere. No two fabrics can be together (no Aa, or Bb, etc.). The next row will be in the same ABCDEF order with three different smaller pieces mixed in–but where?
I need someone with a better brain than mine is right now.
There are a great many possible arrangements that fit those constraints, enough that you’re almost certain to find a few of them just playing around with the pieces on the table. Is there some other constraint we should know?
No other constraint. I’m getting hung up with working in three different smaller pieces instead of just two. (Two would be easy and I can think of many different ways to do two…but three…it’s messing with my head.)
So it seems like there are 5 gaps between the large pieces, and 3 of them will be occupied by one small piece each? 3 different pieces, none of which is identical to the large piece next to it?
Seems like a lot of possibilities, as Chronos said. There are 10 possible patterns (5 choose 3) just for the placement of the 3 small pieces: AxBxCxDEF, AxBxCDxEF, AxBxCDExF, etc. For each of these possibilities, you have 5 possible choices for the first x, at least 3 choices for the second x, and at least 2 choices for the third x. Or something like that, haven’t thought through that part all the way. But all in all, you should have a couple hundred possibilities to choose from.
The 10 possible placements are:
AxBxCxDEF
AxBxCDxEF
AxBxCDExF
AxBCxDxEF
AxBCxDExF
AxBCDxExF
ABxCxDxEF
ABxCxDExF
ABxCDxExF
ABCxDxExF
Just pick one of these at random. Let’s say you pick AxBxCxDEF. For the first x, you can pick randomly from c,d,e or f. If you choose c, the next x can be a,d,e or f. If you pick a here, the third x can be b, e or f (a and b already used, c and d are next to it).
I’m an artist, and deal with similar problems all the time. I’ve found that the only way for me to work out colors is to first do it in a graphic program like Illustrator. I need to actually see how the colors interact with each other. To do it mathematically risks having similar or clashing colors placed adjacently, with undesirable effects. This is one of my pieces, admittedly more random than what you’re planning. But there’s no way I could have worked it out theoretically, without actually seeing the colors and the triangle rotations, and how they interacted with each other.
