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Linda Farmer, Certified Zentangle Teacher

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How to draw BOULDER BUILDER

Zentangle pattern: Boulder Builder. Image © Linda Farmer and TanglePatterns.com. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. You may use this image for your personal non-commercial reference only. The unauthorized pinning, reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal.Hello again my friends!

I hope you had a lovely weekend and are ready for a summer week of national holidays in North America and fun tangles everywhere.

As always I’m delighted to have your company.

Today we have Boulder Builder to explore, it’s a super simple tangle from Canadian CZT Bunny Wright.

Boulder Builder makes an even dozen of Bunny’s great tangles on the site. She writes,

I recently came up with this fun tangle and I think it’s unique in the way it goes together.

It is a different sort of tangle because you can build on it, use it as a filler or as a border or even fill it with tangles and it’s easy and fun to draw.

I love putting it with ‘Strutz‘.

I originally thought of naming it ‘B (building) Blox’, but then I thought these look like boulders so…”Boulder Builders’ it is. I think it has a fun ring to it.

It follows the guidelines and the other day, my husband was admiring it sideways!!!

I asked Bunny if there was any specific logic to subdividing the spaces creating the boulder pattern. These are her suggestions:

It’s just a matter of drawing lines across the rectangle to divide it up as many times as you want.

You start off with one rectangle and randomly divide it into halves, thirds, quarters, whatever.

In turn you can divide those spaces further into as many ‘boulders’ as you like or you can leave them in larger pieces.

I would try to keep them as rectangular or even square but I know some would want to make them into triangles etc.

The beauty is, the ‘boulders’ always fit. Adding connectors or fillers add to the fun of it.

The final touches that makes Boulder Builder work so well are the tiny bits of the tangle enhancer called rounding and the hint of softened graphite shading that adds dimension.

Bunny illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Boulder Builder below. Bunny’s steps and her tiles demonstrate how flexible and fun her tangle can be.

Zentangle patten: Boulder Builder. Image © Linda Farmer and TanglePatterns.com. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. You may use this image for your personal non-commercial reference only. The unauthorized pinning, reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal.

Image copyright the artist and used with permission, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. These images are for your personal offline reference only. Please feel free to refer to the images to recreate this tangle in your personal Zentangles and ZIAs. However the artist and TanglePatterns.com reserve all rights to the images and they must not be publicly pinned, altered, reproduced or republished. Thank you for respecting these rights. Click the image for an article explaining what copyright means in plain English. “Always let your conscience be your guide.” ~ Jiminy Cricket

As you enjoy any of the tangles on the site, please leave a comment of thanks and encouragement to show the artists you appreciate them for sharing their creativity to inspire yours. Your thanks helps motivate them to continue to share! And please share a link to your favorite tangles on social media. Thanks!

Check out the tag bunnyw for more of Bunny’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.

All of Bunny Wright's tangles on TanglePatternsUPDATE August 2020:

It is with great sadness we learned that Bunny passed away on August 8th.

She shared a dozen wonderful tangles with us and will always be fondly remembered for her friendship and creativity.

Her obituary is here.

I’ve linked her photo to the list of her tangles for those inclined to do some “Bunny tangles” in her honor.

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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.
  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!
  10. Never miss a tangle! FREE eMAIL NEWSLETTER - visit the SUBSCRIBE page on the top menu bar of any page on the site and sign up to get notices delivered free to your inbox.

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19 comments to How to draw BOULDER BUILDER

  • Very simple but nice as a filler, I like it very much, thank you for sharing!

  • This is a good one. Will use it right away.

  • Linda Dochter, CZT

    Bunny –

    Your Boulder Builder with Strutz by Sarah Fowler makes a wonderful duotangle as Laura Harms, CZT would call it. I plan to use both and fill Boulders with what I call Ponder Words. Love the whole imagery of building one’s philosophy or purpose. Thanks again.

  • Jennifer Sparrow

    What a great tangle! I want to use it as a reticula / vessel tangle, too! Thank you, Linda and Bunny!

  • Julie

    Looking forward to trying it out!

  • Sandra Riggins

    THis one is fun. Liked the way she joined the bolders. Will be fun to use.

  • Bunny (Frances) Wright

    I wish to set the record straight. It was the tile that was sideways, not my husband!LOL Thanks so much Linda, for adding ‘Boulder Builders’ to the tangle patterns resource site. It’s like a special gift when you see your pattern published. Thanks also for the positive feedback from fellow ‘tanglers’,I am most grateful!

  • Thanks Bunny for a fun fill or border.

  • Jenn Brayton

    Delightful! I’ve had great fun building my boulders on tiles and I”m going to try it on black tiles next 🙂 And when my pen slipped, I wound up with a adorable little crack on one boulder 🙂

  • Deborah Davis

    A great tangle. So many uses. I will use this one! Thank you

  • Melena

    Bunny, this is a great tangle! I love it. I like building things and this will definitely be part of that but on tiles. 😀 Looking forward to using it today! Thanks to Bunny and Linda for getting this up on Tanglepatterns.

  • Elsa Dueñas

    Es fantástico este tangle. Obliga a estudiar el equilibrio, la composición, el balance.
    Es necesario tener en cuenta el peso y el volumen para la colocación correcta de cada pieza.
    Construyendo al estilo antiguo de las edificaciones. Es fantástico y muy divertido! Me encanta.

  • I will miss all the new tangles you had left to share, Bunny! RIP. xo

    • Linda Farmer, CZT

      I was so shocked when I just read your comment, Esther.
      I was not aware Bunny passed away suddenly and peacefully on August 8th at age 77, such sad news.
      Her lovely obituary can be found here.
      Bunny was like the old-fashioned kind of pen pal with me, she always sent chatty emails when she submitted her tangles and kept me posted on what was going on in her life and in the Oshawa area of Ontario.
      We are all so very lucky she was part of our Zentangle community and though she will be missed, her tangles will remind us of her friendship, generosity and creativity. RIP, Bunny.

    • Jenn Brayton

      I’m very saddened to hear that Bunny has passed away. I did not meet her in person, but loved all the tangles she designed, and the humorous comments she posted here and in other tangle communities. She’s been very inspiring to me as a Canadian artist and I know I’ll think of her when I am using her tangles like Boulder Builder (which I have enthusiastically used all summer)

      Thanks for posting this Esther and Linda

  • With this message I would like to give my sincere condolences to Bunny’s family and I’m sure we all will miss her very much in our big Zentanglecommunity.

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