Category Archives: General

Butterfly card and hand, by Jeremy Shafer

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Jeremy Shafer published a youtube tutorial for this flapping butterfly card. Paper: 35 cm double-sided paper from origami-shop.com (don’t try smaller paper on your first try). And yes, the butterfly does flap its wings when you pull on the sides of the card :)

The skeleton hand is found in this video tutorial. Paper: 15 cm kami. People like this model a lot, it’s especially popular around Halloween :)

Both models are high-intermediary. They’re not in his books, but he has many other amusing models to fold :)

Envelopes by Tomoko Fusè

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Those envelopes by Tomoko Fusè are really easy to fold, and really cute. You can simply write inside the envelope, or slide your folded letter inside the envelope. The instructions can be found in “Home decorating with origami”, ISBN 4889960597, pages 38, 41 and 46. There are many other cute models.

Papers: envelopes from A4 printer paper, decorations (stoppers) from 7,5 cm (japanese chiyogami for the crane, washi for the flower) and 9 cm (boat on the right). She recommends 7,5 cm but I find 9 cm looks better – probably a culture difference, I like gaudy better than discreet elegance :) The finished envelopes are 10,5X10,5 cm.

Bird by Edwin Corrie

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This is one of my new favorite models: a bird by Edwin Corrie. I don’t fold many animals, I really prefer boxes and geometrical forms, but I fell in love with this one! The movement in its wings, the amazing folding sequence (and great diagram, although I did find a few things to improve it, I’ll list them at the end of the post).

The model can be found in Le Pli n°145 (revue du Mouvement Français des Plieurs de Papier). Not sure if it has been published somewhere else, but Edwin Corrie published a few other diagrams on his website, and “Origami Animals” by Vicente Palacios has mostly models by Edwin Corrie and is a good book of low-intermediary models. By the way, I met him at the Origami Convention in Blois, and he’s a very nice person, so  if you have an occasion to fold with him, don’t hesitate! (He’s shy though, so go talk to him. Or maybe it was just because we all spoke French).

Paper: satogami 24 cm from origami-shop.com. I had the “paper discovery pack” since a while, but couldn’t get myself to use the beautiful papers – but after folding a few of these birds, as seen below, I finally decided that this model deserved a beautiful paper.

As usual, Pierre-Manuel took the photos, and we both felt that the first of this article turned out great. I really love the shadow.

Papers of 15 and 20 cm. You can see the back of the wings in patterned papers has another color.

And now, my notes on the diagram : it doesn’t use double-sided paper, and the side of the paper is actually important. The bird will be all of the same color, except the back of the wings – it looks better with paper that has the same color on both sides, in my opinion, but if you have single-side paper and want the bird in color, start with the white side on the table, color towards you (and make a square base with the color inside). Then step 12 isn’t clear, you have to fold the top triangles at a 90° angle (align the paper with itself, rotating on the points of the sides).

To hang it from the ceiling, or in a mobile, you can undo the back from step 32, knot a thead around the base of the wings behind the head, and lock it by folding the back again. Voilà, an origami that hangs without holes :)

I’d say the difficulty is intermediary. Definitly not a beginner’s model, but not crazy hard once you’ve folded a while. It’s exactly the right difficulty for me.

Various boxes by Tomoko Fusè

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These are various models by Tomoko Fusè. All are made with 8 sheets of square paper (4 for the lid, 4 for the bottom).

The box on the left is “square box Vortex”, page 62 of “Fabulous Origami Boxes” (Japan Publications Trading Co, ISBN 9780870409783).

The box in the middle is “shallow hexagonal box”, found page 72 of “30 boîtes en origami”.

The box on the right is “Square box C”, page 38 of “Joyful Origami Boxes” (Japan Publications, ISBN 0870409743).

Paper for the rightmost box : japanese chiyogami for the lid, Tant 15 cm for the bottom.

Paper: double-sided 15 cm kraft paper from schoene-papiere.de (sadly they don’t sell anymore at the moment).

Paper: japanese chiyogami 7.5 cm.

 

The same model with different papers:

left: japanese chiyogami 7.5 cm + Tant, right: japanese chiyogami 15 cm (the paper is a bit too thin for the size of the box).

Square flowers boxes + spirals boxes, by Tomoko Fusè

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Those are two similar models, found once again in “30 boîtes en origami” (page 48 for the flower box, 52 for the spiral).

They are made with 8 sheets of square paper, 4 for the bottom and 4 for the lid.

The left spiral box is made from Daiso Fabric paper 15 cm. The right box is made from Daiso Yuzen chiyogami paper Vegetation 15 cm.

The left box is made with star paper found on eBay, the right box is made from music sheets cut to 15 cm, found on amazon.

Details of the lid.

The flower boxes are made from: left, Jong le Nara pattern colored paper flowers for the bottom, Daiso handmade paper Sukigami for the lid, both 15 cm ; right, MarpaJansen glassine paper 10 cm ; middle, Grimmhobby washi chiyogami 7.5 cm (the box is tiny, very cute :)).

Details of the lid.

Pentagonal boxes by Tomoko Fusè

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I already showed this beautiful box by Tomoko Fusè, but here is the variation I made, where the star is on the outside. No idea if this is published somewhere, since I don’t own the book with the model – but it’s really straightforward to find once you’ve folded the first model.

Papers: top, Origami Antistress by Marabout 15cm (beware, those 1000-sheets books don’t have perfectly square sheets and you usually have to cut them again, but I love the colors and patterns) ; bottom left, Origami black and white by Aitoh 7.5 cm ; middle, cheap shinny 5cm paper bought on ebay : right, Origami mini Pop 7.5 cm by Avenue Mandarine.

As I said before, if someone knows the references of the book, I’m interested :)

Edit: Internet’s magic is working ! Michel Grand just wrote to me to say the diagram is in “Origami Gift Boxes”, ISBN 9784140310687 (in japanese). Thank you :)

Cookie Cutter kusudama by Victoria Babinsky + japanese decoration by Minako Ishibashi

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Here are two models I like: a “cookiecutter kusudama” (30 sheets of 7.5 gold paper) and a japanese decoration (6 sheets of the same paper).

The japanese decoration by Minako Ishibashi (right) can be found, for example, in Rick Beech’s book (ISBN 9782215110668 for the French edition).

Papers: left, 7.5cm Showa Grim senbazuru chiyogami ; right, 7.5cm Tant paper.

I really love the stars in this kusudama. The Tant one hanged from my ceiling for a long time.

Cookiecutter kusudama model by Victoria Babinsky ; Jo Nakashima published a youtube tutorial for the cookiecutter.

Rectangular boxes by Tomoko Fusè

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The diagram for these boxes can be found in “30 boîtes en origami”, as mentionned before.

Each box requires 8 square sheets (4 for the lid, 4 for the bottom).

You can see I really like folding the model, I made so much of them (and more, that I gave away before taking the pictures). The three boxes above are made from: leftmost, 7.5 cm kraft paper; top, Showa Grim washi chiyogami 15 cm; right, japanese chiyogami and Tant 15cm.

Papers: left, Aitoh RobinJoyRiggsbee pencil drawings + white Tant for the interior ; middle, Vivi Gade “Paris” paper ; right, Dovecraft “Back to Basics” Monochrome (150 gsm), all in 15 cm.

Papers: middle, japanese chiyogami 7.5 cm ; left and right, 15 cm japanese paper (all is in japanese on the box, can’t give details).

Pop-up bats by Jeremy Shafer

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These adorable bats are very, very popular among all the people I give my origami to. I fold them regularly, because I know people will always be happy to have one – I think it’s partly because of the magic of pop-ups, but they’re also particularly beautiful.

The bat on the right is folded with 24cm double-sided paper. The bat in the middle is from Tuttle Rainbow patterns 15cm. I don’t remember the leftmost paper.

You can find the (beautifully hand-drawned) diagram in “Origami Pop-Ups to Amuse and Amaze” (ISBN 978-1494299026). He also made a youtube video.

 

Double compartment box by David Brill

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David Brill published only one origami book, but it’s one of my favorites : “Brilliant Origami” (ISBN 0870408968). The diagrams are fabulously drawned, the models are varied and interesting to fold.

Papers: top left, 20cm nuinui box “motifs japonais” ; middle left, Showa Grim washi chiyogami 15cm ; bottom left, double-sided kraft from schoenepapiere.de ; center, Djeco 20 cm ; top right, Daiso Modern pattern washi chiyogami ; center right, japanese chiyogami ; bottom right, Daiso metallic chiyogami paper gold and silver.

This model, however, is not in the book. I had folded most models of it by then, so I was looking at his website – hoping he had published more. He hasn’t, sadly, but I saw the photo on the gallery of his website, and commented to ask if the diagram was published (sometimes authors publish models in obscure booklets that can be found with a little search).

I checked his website regularly in the next days, hoping for an answer to my comment, but there was none, so I moved on.

But then, a few months later, I checked again, and there it was! Turns out, the model was not diagramed, but he drew it after I asked – which of course took some time. I was so happy to have the diagram, and touched that he made it for me – I jumped happily around the house for a few days, and spent quite a while folding a lot of them, as you can see.

So on his website you can find the diagram!

Enjoy! (and don’t hesitate buying the book, whatever your favorite origami is, there’s some in it :))