Drawing as the Beginning of a System.

Having trained in applied arts and surface design - where playful image-making was central to our practice - drawing, experimenting with a motif and pushing forms around the page were all actively encouraged (and indeed is something I love to see my own students do too!). But almost always, those drawings were/are heading somewhere else, destined for repeat: for fabric, wallpaper, or surface; for composition at scale and, probably because of that, I’m increasingly wondering if the playfulness I embrace is ever entirely free.

Alongside the encouragement to explore, sits an unspoken logic: one where the marks and lines I am inspired to make, potentially have consequences later on in the design process. My decisions when drawing could easily result in a repeat that was, at best, quick to formulate or one which would always feel a little ‘off’ and take an eternity to get right. Over time I’ve definitely realised how much that awareness has shaped the way I approach drawing; it’s generally an unconscious decision making process, but when I tune in and notice myself doing it, it’s absolutely there. 

From the first line, I’ve noticed I'm already subconciously thinking about repetition, balance, and the behaviour of shapes when placed in arrangement together. That awareness can be productive giving me convidence that I will speed up the design process further down the line, but it can also feel like a continuous negotiation between play and purpose. As I draw, I’m potentially second-guessing the angle of a line, the direction of a curve, the weight of a dominant element. Learning how to ‘draw for design’ has trained me to think relationally from the very first mark, which could (if I let it) easily take the fun out of it! My surface design training has made it difficult to really treat drawing as a single expressive gesture, always wanting to treat it as the beginning of a system or process that will follow. 

Examples of drawings from Caroline Pratt's Studio.

When this awareness enters the process too early, composition isn’t something that arrives later, it’s already there, embedded in the act of drawing itself. Directionality matters straight away. Density matters. A line that feels elegant on its own can quickly become overbearing once it repeats. A motif that looks great in isolation can fall completely flat when multiplied. In textile print design, nothing exists alone. A motif is a unit waiting to encounter others; each mark already imagines its neighbours, anticipating how it will sit within a larger field.  

The more I reflect on my practice, the more I recognise a constant negotiation between what the forms I’m drawing appear to represent and how they behave. I’m not drawing flower stems so much as directional lines; not petals, but motifs that must consider spacing and tension. The initial drawing holds a set of invisible rules, learned through experience; that will later determine whether the work holds together once it becomes a repeat. 

Reading The Rule of Curves, a gorgeous, recently published book on the works of artist and designer Sophie Taeuber-Arp, suggested that perhaps this approach might not always be ‘anti-play’, that it potentially offers new perspectives in different contexts. Taeuber-Arp also trained in the applied arts (textiles, embroidery, pattern) and that training informed her entire approach to visual form. Rather than embracing the rigid, rectilinear grids that dominated much of early Modernism, she gravitated toward curves, biomorphic structures, and rhythmic systems. 

Pages from: Sophie Taeuber-Arp: The Rule of Curves (2026)

What struck me most was her belief that no form is ever self-sufficient. Forms are constantly acting on one another, adjusting, responding, reshaping the whole. This, I'm pretty sure, feels immediately familiar to anyone who has drawn with repeat in mind. A shape only reveals itself fully once it has company. A motif that feels resolved on its own can suddenly fall apart when placed into relation with others - a frustrating but familiar experience! 

Taeuber-Arp’s work is often described as sitting between the diagrammatic and the decorative, a phrase that perhaps feels particularly resonant for textile and surface practice. Decoration becomes a way of thinking, structure exists, but it’s alive and it breathes. 

This idea of “soft systems” feels central to drawing for design. Whilst I enjoy formal grids and stripes, I’m also very drawn to structures that emerge through interaction: curves that counterbalance one another and directional lines that require interruption. Having always been taught to aim for a pattern that has flow and will ‘allow your eye to dance about it’ I definitely don’t see this as a ‘failure of control’, but a sign that a pattern has character and life. 

Training in pattern and surface teaches you to anticipate consequence. It asks you to think beyond the single motif, testing your knowledge of proportion, rhythm, and scale that’s so often felt immediately when something is off, even before you can name why. I used to do a fun little exercise where I’d get my students to critique a peers repeat, highlighting motifs which were too dominate or where there were obvious fault-lines – you'd be surprised how quickly they trained their eye to spot them!  

Back in my own studio, I notice how often the most important decisions are barely visible. A softened edge. A slight shift in spacing. A line interrupted just enough to stop it dominating the surface. These modest gestures are what hold the system together. 

Drawing for design isn’t about producing the perfect image. It’s about setting up conditions for balance and variation, trusting that the repeat will reveal what works and what doesn’t. 

Once you’ve been trained to think this way, it’s difficult to unsee. Every mark already carries a larger composition with it. 

I’m curious how others experience this, that constant negotiation between play and consequence, freedom and foresight. For those working in print and surface, does the repeat arrive later for you, or is it already semi present in the very first line?