Inktober Tangles - Day 1 - Festune by Zentangle For my Inktober 2025 Project, I am following the tangle list from Stephanie Jennifer, CZT . If you want to know more about it, you can click on her name to go to her website. Today’s tangle is Festune. It looks a bit like a fancy cushion that you might use to decorate your living room. Depending on how you draw them, they might look a bit like a paper umbrella! I love to draw them piling up as if they were thrown or dropped into a haphazard pile.
Random tangles, no string. Sometimes, when I choose random tangles, I don’t use a string. This is the case here. I could see (in my mind’s eye) how these tangles would fit together so I just went with my mental vision. I love drawing Cartoosh! It’s fun to create those connected spirals and then draw the lines to see what they turn into! This tangle is another one of my favorites.
“One Zentangle A Day” by Beckah Krahula, Day 3. The focus of this chapter is creating depth by overlapping designs. Above, you can see how the Poke Root stems and fruit weave in front of or behind the ribbons of the Hollibaugh tangle. At the top, the third tangle, Festune is drawn “behind” these ribbons. In Zentangle, the term “drawing behind” is used to describe this technique. Although this tile is simple, you have to really think about what you are doing. Sections have to be drawn in the proper order to achieve the layering effect.
It was graduation day for my Saturday morning tribe! They created tiles using Renaissance techniques. I’m so honored that this group allowed me to start them off on their Zentangle adventures. I’m sure I’ll be seeing lots from them in the future! Zentangle drawn on Official tan 3Z tiles using a black and brown, Micron pens. Shading done with graphite pencil. Highlights created with white chalk pencil. Tangles: Festune Ravel Striping
A little over a year ago, I posted a tan, 3Z tile with this design . I was looking at it yesterday, and wondered what would happened if I used the same tangles and string, but in a different color? Here, I’ve tried it in the colors of the Delft Delights tiles. It’s interesting how there are differences and similarities to the previous version! Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol 3Z-size tile, using several different blue, Micron pens. Shading and highlights done with colored pencil and gel pen.
One of the things I love about tan tiles is the ability to add both shades of grey and white highlights. In addition, these tiles are perfect for both brown, black and even white ink, creating lots of variety. All of these factors, added together take simple tangles to a much more sophisticated level! Zentangle drawn on a tan Official Zentangle 3Z tile using black and brown, Pigma Micron pens. Shading done with graphite pencil. Highlights done with white charcoal pencil.
Palette. Her basket was full of magical designs just waiting to be added to a frock or a cushion. Some plain, some fancy, some simple, some complex, woven together they created a magical mixture for the customers to choose from. The basic string for this Zentangle came from the Tangler's Palette" stencils from Acadia Laser Creations on Etsy. I wanted this set of stencils as soon as I saw them. They offer so many different possibilites for creative play!
Halloween. All the goodies were ready, filling the bowl, nestled into the spider’s web. She waited on a bench by the door with the bowl in her lap. Would they come, dressed in outlandish garb? Or would they dance in the light of the fire and simply ignore her? This is a very simple tile, with only three tangles. But by overlapping and allowing various parts to grow outside of boundaries, the tangles take on a life of their own.
Night-blooming. To me, this looks like it could be the blossom of some kind of night-blooming cactus! It was kind of wild and crazy before I added the shading and the gold accents. The metallic shimmer added a lot of sophistication. Zentangle drawn on Strathmore Vellum Bristol using a black, Micron pen. Shading done with graphite pencil. Tangles: Chainlea Cobbles Festune Pais
The process. One of the things about tangling is that it is a meditative process. I focus on each line I draw, and often don‘t have a clear picture of where the over-all design is going. This is particularly true when I select tangles at random, as I did here. Sometimes the over-all design works, and sometimes it doesn‘t. But there are days when the process is what is most important.