Designer Diary: Taking to the Slopes!

Hey Puzzle Bomb fam!

While I was never an expert skier, I always enjoyed heading over to Colorado to enjoy the green circle and blue square runs at places like Winter Park. For me, it was all about meandering through the trails, enjoying the view from the lifts, and just having a relaxing time, rather than thrill-seeking. My knees no longer enjoy skiing, but there's lots of good memories, and I thought it would make good subject matter for a puzzle!

The Initial Idea

Polychrome Slalom is a theme-first design, so I set off to sketch out the basic visual layout of the subject matter. In my mind, there would be an assortment of skiers, leaving colorful, meandering paths behind them through the snow. While there was still a lot of developing and decision-making to do, here was the initial, very boring sketch.

The overall layout would stay remarkably unchanged in the final product, but most of the work was still to be done.

The hardest part about designing theme-first puzzles is to then figure out how to introduce interesting and unique cut patterns into that thematic framework. Even better when the cut patterns can be informed by the theme!

Two Puzzles in One

Due to the layout of the illustration, I decided to essentially design two puzzles here: the upper sky area, and the lower ski area. I knew this choice would make the puzzle easier, as the pieces would likely be sortable into two distinct groups, so it meant I had to balance that out with some tricky cut patterns!

The Upper Sky Area

Thinking of winter themes, I decided snowflakes would make for a really interesting theme, both being pretty, and a highly connective shape. I also knew I wanted some fairly intricate snowflakes, making this section highly detailed and tricky.

After some Googling, I found this super neat snowflake generator. It's a bit of a mesmerizing tool, so I spent quite a while playing around, occasionally saving a snowflake that I liked, until I had enough for the puzzle!

I do most things by hand on pencil and paper, but the layout of the snowflakes was a digital step, as it allowed me to drag around, rotate, and reposition the snowflakes until I had an arrangement I liked.

To add to the trickiness, I added a border of snowflake elements, which introduces a little visual confusion (a good confusion!) during assembly. I also solved the connection between the sky and land with some strategically-placed trees.

The last step was for this section was cutting up the non-snowflake sky area. I realized I could allow the snowflakes to provide all of the connectivity with some thoughtfully-placed simple lines, making for a really interesting solve experience. This step probably looks simple, as the lines are nothing fancy, but it actually takes a careful eye to track which snowflakes are connecting to which other snowflakes to create a solidly interlocking puzzle.

Designing the Slopes

I really had a bear of a time deciding what to do with the slopes, as I wanted something interesting, visually appealing, and challenging. I eventually decided on something that didn't feel super clever, but modeled the peaceful flow of a well-groomed ski trail. I used those initial curvy paths to inform the entire design.


It definitely achieves the challenge aspect, as it's a large amount of visually similar pieces. It's not as interesting/unique as I might like, but I do like the visual flow of all the meandering paths and opportunity for an irregular edge.

Just one problem; none of it connects!  :D I can't seem to find the final file where I connected everything up, but I decided on a plethora of little snowballs. In some ways, I don't love how they interrupt the smooth, curvy flow, but the puzzle had to connect somehow!

Putting it all Together

The color scheme had all been pretty solid in my mind, with the blue sky, natural-colored "snow", and colorful skiers with the paths they leave in the snow. After the initial coloring, I decided to lighten the snowflakes a bit to allow them to visually stand out more, as the sky was a bit bland without that bit of texture.

I was super pleased with it all when the sample arrived!

Even better, experientially, this puzzles plays as two fun and challenging mini-puzzles as I had intended. When you design puzzles of this nature, it's still a bit of a question mark as to whether the tangible experience matches what you had in mind as you designed it.

At 26 puzzles in, I'm getting better at making thoughtful design decisions that create a certain experience, but it's still a fun surprise to do my own puzzles for the first time, discovering the thing I set out to create!

This is my absolute favorite part of designing puzzles; not just cranking out another puzzle to fulfill my obligation to provide you with a new puzzle each month, but to present you with a unique experience that differs from all the previous experiences I've given you. Yes, I want it to be visually stunning and neat to look at as art, but ultimately, the puzzling experience is where it's at. Marrying those two is challenging, but so rewarding!

Love and blessings,
Chad aka the Puzzle Bomb Design Guy