How to draw SKWIRL

After our challenging Friday tangle pattern, I figured I’d better follow up with one that’s totally manageable. 🙂

Annie Taylor’s Skwirl is a perfect tangle to demonstrate how effective a tiny little bit of shading can be. And it’s so easy! This is Annie’s first tangle on the site.

Annie was intrigued by an image she saw and writes, “what prompted me to turn it into a tangle was a visual ‘test’ on Facebook recently = how many circles can you see? …

I have simplified things but obviously, shading and more lines could make it look even more intricate but if you like the ‘pop’ of Zentangle®, you’ll love this one! 

I’ve called the tangle ‘Skwirl’ as it’s a mixture of circle and square….“

She introduces herself,

“I am English, living in southern Spain with my Spanish husband and our 3 children.

I found Zentangle in September 2013 through a happy ‘accident’ and haven’t stopped tangling since. Your site is an essential tool to anyone learning Zentangle by themselves and I do appreciate the great work you do.“

Skwirl takes advantage of CZT Carole Ohl’s “trademark” technique of loosely connecting the corners of strokes, as introduced in her very cool Puf tangle. However, instead of using the 01 Sakura Micron to make the connections, in Skwirl Annie connects them with pencil for a subtle effect.

Annie illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Skwirl on her blog. She shows it together in a Zentangle with another cool 3D tangle, the Zentangle-original that’s one of my faves, Dex.

Update September 10, 2018 – Annie’s blog has been removed so I’ve removed the link. Here are her steps for tangling Skwirl.

Image copyright the artist and used with permission, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please feel free to refer to the steps images to recreate this tangle in your personal Zentangles and ZIAs, or to link back to this page. However the artist and TanglePatterns.com reserve all rights to these images and they must not be publicly pinned, altered, reproduced or republished. They are for your personal offline reference only. Thank you for respecting these rights. Click the image for an article explaining what copyright means in plain English. “Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” ~ C.S. Lewis

Check out the tag anniet for more of Annie’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.

Related Links

1. Looking for tangles by Artist or Type? For details visit the ABOUT > HOW TO FIND TANGLES BY ARTIST OR TYPE page on the top menu bar of any page on the site.
2. What is a Zentangle? — if you are new to the Zentangle Method, start here for the fundamentals.
3. Zentangle terminology — a glossary of terms used in this art form.
4. How to use the site — an excellent free video tutorial showing how to use the site as well as pointing out lots of useful features you might have missed.
5. Linda's List of Zentangle-Original Patterns — here is the complete list of original tangles (aka "official tangles") created and introduced by founders Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas, including those not published online. If you are new to the Zentangle Method I highly recommend learning a few of the published Zentangle classics first.
6. "A Zentangle has no up or down and is not a picture of something, so you have no worries about whether you can draw a hand, or a duck. You always succeed in creating a Zentangle." Thus patterns that are drawings of a recognizable naturalistic or actual object, figure, or scene, are not tangles. A pattern is not always a tangle — here's what makes a tangle. TIP: tangles never start with pencil planning.
   • Un motif n’est pas toujours un tangle — Qu’est-ce qu’un tangle ?
   • Un diseño no es siempre un tangle — ¿Qué es un tangle?
7. How to submit your pattern deconstruction to TanglePatterns
8. For lots of great FREE tutorials on TanglePatterns, click on the TUTORIALS link in the pink alphabetic menu bar below the tangle images at the top of any page.
9. Strings! Have we got STRINGS! Click on the STRINGS link in the pink alphabetic menu bar below the tangle images at the top of any page for 250 different (free) Zentangle-starters. More than enough for any lifetime!
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11. If you have questions about the TanglePatterns.com TANGLE GUIDE, visit the BOOK REVIEWS tab on the top menu bar of any page on the site for COMPLETE details!

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