Pattern (repetition)

“ At the same time in all patterns which are meant to fill the eye and satisfy the mind, there should be a certain mystery. We should not be able to read the whole thing at once, nor desire to do so, nor be impelled by that desire to go on tracing line after line to find out how the pattern is made, and I think that the obvious presence of a geometrical order, if it be, as it should be, beautiful, tends towards this end, and prevents our feeling restless over a pattern. ”

“ Variety is one of the great laws of the universe, and alternation is a blending of variety and repetition This will be gathered from a reference to diagram where the braiding alternates, first forming a crow's toe and then a simple eye. It is the succession of two different objects or forms recurring regularly in turn. There can be no alternation without repetition, but there can be repetition without alternation. ”

“ With them it is difficult to obtain that intermingling of colours, be they bright or dull, that produces a neutral bloom and a satisfactory result. Another important point in a pattern, and often overlooked, or not understood, is that, unless the pattern, as a whole, is satisfactory, no variety or beauty of detail can make it a good design. The general character or lines of the pattern must first be made satisfactory, after which the detail may be made as interesting as possible, provided it does not injure the general effect, and is not incongruous to the nature of the design. ”

“ Here it is sufficient to recall4 that the absolutely necessary technique of weaving in all its various forms of interlacing, plaiting, netting, embroidering, etc., implies order, uniformity, and symmetry. The chance introduction of a thread or withe of a different color, brings out at once an ordered pattern in the result; the crowding together or pressing apart of elements, a different alternation of the woof, a change in the order of intersection, all introduce changes by the natural necessities of construction which have the effect of purpose. ”

“ Here, here is the point where the aspect called pattern is most closely in touch with its material; here is our starting point. It springs mainly from the plot, accompanies it like a light in the clouds, and remains visible after it has departed. Beauty is sometimes the shape of the book, the book as a whole, the unity, and our examination would be easier if it was always this. But sometimes it is not. When it is not I shall call it rhythm. For the moment we are concerned with pattern only. ”

“ It is time we should return to the consideration of abstract forms. Nearest in nature to the example of uniformity in multiplicity, we found those objects, like a reversible pattern, that having some variety of parts invite us to survey them in different orders, and so bring into play in a marked manner the faculty of apperception. ”

“ That every line in a pattern should have its due growth, and be traceable to its beginning, this, which you have doubtless heard before, is undoubtedly essential to the finest pattern work; equally so is it that no stem should be so far from its parent stock as to look weak or wavering. Mutual support and unceasing progress distinguish real and natural order from its mockery, pedantic tyranny.
Every one who has practised the designing of patterns knows the necessity for covering the ground equably and richly. ”

“ I have seen a good deal of the practice of putting pattern over pattern in paper-hangings, and it seems to me a very unsatisfactory one, and I am, in short, convinced, as I hinted just now, that cheap recurring patterns in a material which has no play of light in it, and no special beauty of its own, should be employed rather sparingly, or they destroy all refinement of decoration and blunt our enjoyment of whatever beauty may lie in the designs of such things. ”

“ If any one has in his lifetime invented a pattern, he has done something truly remarkable, and as rare as is a really original thought on any subject. Patterns are commonly, like men, the result of many centuries of long descent from ancestors of remote antiquity. ”

“ It was in that way that we came to regard repetitions and alternations as illustrations of Harmony rather than of [Pg 59] Rhythm. Rhythm comes into the Harmony of a Repeated Relation when the relation is one which causes the eye to move in one direction rather than another, and when the movement is carried on from repetition to repetition, from measure to measure.
81. The repetition of a motive at equal intervals, when there is no movement in the motive, gives us no feeling of Rhythm.
Fig. 102
In this case, for example, we have a repetition in the line of a certain symmetrical shape. ”

“ If one attempted to intensify the repeated object in any way, either hanging another string, thickening the strings, or any similar device, it ceased to be the old unit but became a new one, whose repetition was followed for its own sake, while the weaker one retired into the background, and was not felt as the element repeated in the series. ”

“ Now that we have schools of design, and more accessible specimens of art, the direction is given without the aids—“Make a new pattern,” and the artist sits down with nothing before him but pencil and paper—unless, indeed, he finds aids for himself in wild flowers, and other such instructors in beauty of form and color. By degrees, the different parts of the pattern shape themselves out, and combine—the centre groups with the ends, and the ends grow out into the sides with a natural and graceful transition. ”

“ Any pattern or design which shows prominently any set pattern, or spots which suggest a sum of multiplication, or which, in the half-light of night or early morning, might be likely to fix themselves upon the tired brain, suggesting all kinds of weird forms, are especially to be avoided. The design should be of such a description that, saving as regards colour, it should offer no specially marked pattern. ”

“ We have, then, considered variation of units in a repeated series, where they may vary and where they must, and we find the real value of repetition to appear in inverse proportion to the individual significance of the separate units; the more interesting or expressive the unit is in itself with individual significance, the less do we want it repeated ”

“ Do not be afraid of large patterns; if properly designed they are more restful to the eye than small ones: on the whole, a pattern where the structure is large and the details much broken up is the most useful. Large patterns are not necessarily startling; this comes more of violent relief of the figure from the ground, or inharmonious colouring: beautiful and logical form relieved from the ground by well-managed contrast or gradation, and lying flat on the ground, will never weary the eye. ”

“ A picture indeed may be considered as a pattern of another sort, and the real difference is that whereas a pattern is not necessarily a picture, a picture is bound to be a pattern—a pattern having its quantities, its balance of masses, its connecting lines, its various planes, its key of colour, its play of contrasts, its harmony of tones. ”

“ In making a pattern the first thing to be decided upon is some main idea, the detail that is to carry it out must then be considered. This latter may be of various types, such as flowers, foliage, figures, animals, geometrical forms, interlacing strapwork, quatrefoils, &c., &c.; perhaps several of these motifs may be combined together in the same design. ”

“ The persons who have the tendency to build story-type models will be very much disturbed by the repetitions, as the repetition sends them back to the point where the statement appeared for the first time. This will fragment the story- type model. Once fragmented, it cannot be continued and a new story-type model has to be built. ”

“ PATTERN, a model, that which serves as an original from which similar objects may be made, or as an example or specimen; in particular an artistic design serving as a sample or model, hence the arrangement or grouping of lines, figures, &c., which make up such a design. ”

“ When checks or large patterns are to be formed this is most essential, but in smaller patterns it can in a great measure be remedied by letting the various textures follow each other, so that if one tightens a little another will make a corresponding slackness, and all together will balance each other. ”

“ Limitations also, both as to imitation and exuberance, are imposed on us by the office our pattern has to fulfil. A small and often-recurring pattern of a subordinate kind will bear much less naturalism than one in a freer space and more important position, and the more obvious the geometrical structure of a pattern is, the less its parts should tend toward naturalism. This has been well understood from the earliest days of art to the very latest times during which pattern-designing has clung to any wholesome tradition, but is pretty generally unheeded at present. ”

“ Two patterns may sometimes alternate, but in very large surfaces another distinct pattern should be introduced, at certain intervals, to relieve the monotony. Care must be taken to make the network and pattern of the proper scale for the building or room, and for the other decoration. ”

“ Lines moving in circles away from a common center hold attention on that center. Repetition can work for emphasis without monotony, provided it be a repetition with variety of circumstances. Contrast between two simultaneous motions or between a motion and an abrupt rest may be double-acting, that is, may emphasize in both directions. ”

“ In the units lies the meaning of the repetition, in the regular alternates the possibility of its expression.
(4) The rhythmic character of repetition is not felt by a certain type of subject, when it goes smoothly. When a variation is made which would destroy any possible rhythm, its lack is felt, and its violation finds expression only in rhythmic terms.
(5) More violation is done to a series to have the size of units varied than the filling. (This corroborates previous experiments.) ”

“ In designing, too, unless we can so contrive the essential characteristics of our pattern that they shall be adaptable to the method and material of its production, and make its reproduction quite practicable, it is sure to reappear more or less marred and incomplete. The thing is to discover what kind of character and beauty the method will allow of—whether beauty or quality of line, or surface, or colour, or material ”

“ In other words, if the two series of units run between each other, they form one series or rhythm. Two rhythms cannot be kept up alongside; so if one unit, however regularly placed with regard to another of its own kind, recurs at unequal distances from the other units, the feeling of the repetition is lost, the rhythm broken, unless the two units can be grouped into one, and so make a single rhythm again. ”

“ There is more variety of pattern,—in most [Pg 229] cases of very elegant pattern,—in the sliced fragments of the teeth of the ichthyolites of a single formation, than in the carved blocks of an extensive calico-print yard. Each species has its own distinct pattern, as if in all the individuals of which it consisted the same block had been employed to stamp it; each genus has its own general type of pattern, as if the same inventive idea, variously altered and modified, had been wrought upon in all. ”

“ The consideration of quantities in form and design involves the question of contrast, which, indeed, can hardly be separated from it. There is the contrast of form and line, and the contrast of colour and plane. It is with the first kind we are dealing now.
Take the simplest linear border, such as the type common in Greek work. We should easily weary of the continual repetition of such a form alone and unassisted, but add a vertical with an alternative dark filling, and we get a certain richness and solidity which is a relief at once. ”

“ All our patterns are right here. We keep all makes, all styles, and all sizes. Have you the number? You want a pattern for a street dress or a house dress? What size is the lady? How tall? How old? That is—I mean—is it your wife. or—”
“Or my grandmother!” broke in John Hampton. “I don’t want a pattern at all, if you'll kindly give me a chance to say so. That is, I want a dress pattern—not a pattern of a dress! ”

“ Moreover, it was difficult to find a scale of judgment by which to decide whether a series was really alternating or plain repetition. From one point of view, every repetition is alternating, that is, the repeated unit always alternates with an empty space. Although such repetitions bear out the theory still further, and emphasize yet more strongly the invariability of alternates, and the possibility of variations in the principal units, I have used the term in a stricter sense, and only given illustrations of repeated objects, when one unit actually alternated with another definite unit. ”

“ Arcs having the same length but varying in both radius and angle may be felt to be in Measure-Harmony. It is doubtful, however, whether lines of the same length but of very different curvatures will be felt to correspond. If the correspondence of lengths is not felt, visually, it has no interest or value from the point of view of Pure Design.
68. Any line may be continued in a repetition or repetitions of its shape, whatever the shape is, producing what I call a Linear Progression. In the repetitions we have Shape-Harmony.
Fig. 77
This is an example of Linear Progression. ”

“ A pattern is the least number of ends and picks on which a cloth can be woven, the picks or ends of a second pattern being facsimilæ of the first.
The analysis or pricking of patterns is performed by an experienced man without the tedious process of pulling the cloth asunder, the pattern being read from the face of the cloth by means of a cloth-glass. ”

“ I have heard an old weaver say that when she works the hit-and-miss pattern she will carry first one stripe of the background the entire way across and probably start the second row. A little strip of the second colour is then used and then the background again. The good worker never cuts her strips all the same length but strives to get the effect of little slashes of colour against a solid background. ”