Mistakes Were Made - 27 Aug 2025

This will be a long one

So while copying a standard pattern onto a piece of A5 paper, I made a mistake when transferring a tracing, and the pattern had a ‘flaw’. I thought it looked interesting, so tried to deconstruct it, then reconstruct on a larger scale. The plan I came up with looked like this:

Plan for hybrid pattern

Here the different coloured circles (red, blue) are the elements (macroelements?) from the original pattern, laid out here as square geometry and octagonal geometry in an alternating pattern. Joining these - in the gaps - are yellow circles which are the flaws from the original attempt on A5 (flaw parts in cross-hatching).

Drafting at the final scale

I took this plan, and sketched it out at the A3 scale I was planning, to see how the flaws would fall out. In doing this, I realised that the flaws had an orientation:

Draft of the hybrid pattern on a larger scale

I found here that masking tape (maybe obviously?) was really useful for showing the orientation of the flaws. I ‘classified’ them, and planned to make them more regular in the final version.

Final

Finally, on nicer A3 paper, I traced out more carefully the final pattern, trying to make the flaws obvious.

Final hybrid pattern on a larger scale

The colours I chose were deliberate - a more neutral tan/blue for most elements, and red for the flaw parts. It did not quite work - the flaws are not as obvious as I had hoped, and indeed I accidentally left out some of the flaws! I realised you can probably fill in the gaps just using existing elements.

Mistakes were made.

Anyway, I think the final result is still interesting, and I like it even if it did not quite achieve what I hoped.