Prompts Minimal
Ten Minutes, One Colour
A timer, one colour family and a rule against undoing anything. The point is not the page you make in ten minutes — it is finding out which decisions you make twice.
5 layers 4 min
Presort, then start the clock
The ten minutes covers layout and gluing only. Pulling scraps out of a box is not part of the exercise — presort nine to twelve pieces in one colour family before the timer starts, and put the box away. If you find yourself reaching for the box at minute four, that is the finding: you did not commit to the palette, you committed to a starting point.
No undoing
Once a piece is down it stays down. Most people lose four to six of the ten minutes re-lifting pieces that were fine, and the second placement is almost never better than the first because the first was made with the whole page in view. Work left to right and treat every placement as final.
One colour family, three values
A single colour family still needs value contrast or the page becomes a flat field. Sort your presorted scraps into light, mid and dark before starting. Use roughly 60% mid, 25% light and 15% dark. If all your scraps are the same value, that is a supply problem, not a design problem — and it is worth knowing before you sit down, not during minute seven.
What to do with the result
Do not evaluate the page for at least a day. Timed work looks weak immediately after because you remember every compromise. Photograph it, put it in the book, and look again tomorrow. Across a month of daily ten-minute spreads you will find that two or three are genuinely good, and those two or three will be better than anything you would have made in an hour.
Assembly order
- 1Presort nine to twelve scraps in one colour family into light, mid and dark.
- 2Put the rest of your stock out of reach and set the timer for ten minutes.
- 3Place the mid-value pieces first, covering roughly 60% of the page.
- 4Add light pieces, then two or three dark ones for contrast.
- 5Glue left to right without lifting anything, then photograph and close the book.
About 4 minutes of bench time, plus whatever the adhesive needs.
Supplies
- Timer 10 minutes, visible dial
- Paper scraps in one colour family 9-12 pcs, presorted
- Glue stick 8 g
- One pen any
The rules
| Rule | Limit | Enforced how |
|---|---|---|
| Time | 10 minutes, layout and gluing only | visible timer |
| Pieces | 9-12, presorted, box put away | no reaching for stock |
| Colour | one family, three values, 60/25/15 | sorted before the clock |
| Undo | none | left-to-right, final placements |
| Judgement | not before the next day | photograph and close the book |
Where this goes wrong
The common failure is turning the ten minutes into a warm-up and then making the real page afterwards. The warm-up page is the real page. Do one, close the book, and stop.
