Hello and Happy Spring to all my tangling friends in the Northern Hemisphere, Happy Fall to all my tangling friends in the Southern Hemisphere! Two glorious seasons for us to relish …
Welcome back, it’s so good to see you 🙂 Today we have a sweet and simple ribbon-style tangle.
Fanella is from Canadian tangler Cyndi Knapp. Cyndi will be familiar to you as we explored her Uulie tangle a few weeks ago and she has many more on the site you’ll want to be sure to check out.
Cyndi describes her inspiration for the tangle and its name:
The inspiration for this pattern was a balcony railing that I caught a glimpse of while visiting friends in Florida. Based on a zigzag line, this ribbon pattern is very quick and easy to tangle.
To me, the pattern resembled alternating fans when it was finished but a name didn’t readily come to mind until I came across this interesting article about “The Handheld Fan and Its Secret Language“.
The inventor’s name was “Fenella” and that inspired the name Fanella.
Who knew handheld fans have a secret language “used to communicate discreetly”!
The first semiofficial gestural fan language was written by a Spanish man known simply as Fenella. It didn’t take long for Parisian fan-maker Duvelleroy, whose finery-filled shop is still in business, to translate his work into English, and distribute the information on individual cards. The use of this so-called “Secret Language of the Fan” varied from country to country, but today, many of Fenella’s original instructions are still circulated in print.
Here’s a sampling of the examples in the Vogue article that inspired the name for Cyndi’s Fanella tangle:
“Come talk to me” – Carry fan in left hand
“I wish to speak to you” – Touch tip of fan with finger
“You have won my love” – Hold shut fan to the heart
“Do not betray our secret” – Covering left ear with open fan
“Follow me” – Carry fan in right hand in front of face
What fun, check it out, some sound very James Bond-ish. The things we learn through tangle rabbit holes!! (And oh my, those gorgeous fans from Duvelleroy!)
Cyndi illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Fanella below where she shows some easy variations to explore and features it in a Zentangle® tile with Margaret Bremner’s Copada, and the Zentangle-original Crescent Moon and Narfello.
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. (Small side note: if you look at the legalese in Pinterest, you are legally responsible for obtaining permission to post every photo that gets ‘Pinned’. Giving credit or sharing the source link doesn’t count.) 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
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Check out the tag cyndik for more of Cyndi’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.
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March 20, 2023 | 
More like this: 
Love Cyndi’s tangle! Very versatile. Thanks for posting.
The only bad thing is that I clicked the link to the fan maker. Now I want a fan. They are gorgeous!
Such an elegant tangle! The story which inspired this tangle is also so intriguing. Thank you very much for both.
Fun – fun – fun! Thank you 🙂
nice and uncomplicated newie, thanks for sharing!
It reminds me of a lacey trim sewn on top of seams. Thank you. I really like it.
I’ve used this one several times – so versatile
Lovely pattern! I love it!