Few modern origamists are as prolific and inventive as Jeremy Shafer – he seems to be creating new models constantly, and most importantly, his designs are fun to fold:
This is his Pyramid Tessellation field – each molecule has pre-creases that have easy landmarks, meaning you could expand this field in any direction as far as you have patience for.
This version is a 4×4 field of 16 separate square-based pyramids – a lovely thing in itself but when you start playing with it it starts to do wonderfully weird things.
Using just the existing creases, the model flexes diagonally and also horizontally/vertically. When you flex it diagonally it turns in on itself and COLLAPSES down to a hexagonal stack – this initially broke my brain until I noticed the pre-creasing actually formed pyramidal faces that are equilateral triangles – the collapse then is just one state it can be arranged into.
30 unit modulars exist in many forms, permutations and complications, few rival “Russian Lilac” for sheer time-consuming brutality:
Designed by Andrey Ermakov, this astonishing spikey ball has been quite a journey. I first added it to my “to fold” pile for a few years now, and then narrowly missed folding it as part of the IOIO (Internet Origami Olympiad) in 2021 – it was the nightmare round 2 task (I was knocked out in round 1).
The FIRST hurdle for folding this is the need to create 30 perfect regular hexagons that are all the same size (I created a few extra just in case shit went sideways). To do this, I cleaved a 2.1:1 rectangle from a 70cm wide roll of white/natural Kraft paper. Using 47 construction lines to form a regular TRIANGLE GRID on this page, I was then able to isolate 35 adjacent hexagons, which I then cut out carefully (scissors warning!!!).
Each hexagon then receives a 16 grid in all 3 axes, then 4 extra pre-creases before you begin unit folding. This totaled 1470 pre-creasing. Having bailed near the end of this year’s “Advent of Tessellations”, determined to return to it after some distance, I am not sure why i then bounced to another triangle grid on hexagon marathon project – I am guessing the time with my counsellor will eventually surface the reasons for the self-inflicted PTSD đŸ˜›
To form each unit, each hexagon then goes through 79 processes – all up each unit took me just over an hour each.
The main premise behind “2d colour-change origami” models (of which the flattened unit is one) is that you strategically utilise the edges of the sheet so you can reveal both sides of the paper along it by some clever flanges and flipping. The GENIUS of this model is that we use colour change to (when assembled) establish a colour-change triangle checkerboard across ALL outer faces of the finished polygon. Sadly each little triangle is not SEAMLESS – most are but not all, but based on my experience folding Daniel Brown’s seamless chessboards, I know this provision makes the design infinitely harder.
Having folded Robert Lang’s masterpiece Cactus, when I saw Daniel Brown had designed a smaller version based on a 31 square grid, I knew I would be folding that sometime:
I have been really into time-consuming surface deformations, corrugations and tessellations lately – whether it is procrastigami or the need for a time-sponge, pushing paper into amazing regular shapes is just fascinating to me.
I threw a 50cm square of glossy duo green/natural Damul Kraft paper from origami-shop.com at this design, but the resultant fold is tiny – few tessellations eat paper like this one. The rows of prickles are raised via overlapping pleats in an astonishing collection of cooperating maneuvers where accuracy and thickness is everything.
My previous fold was rendered from a 90cm square of Kraft that I painted after it was folded. The thickness make point sharpening really challenging. This fold using Damul Kraft made the fold much easier because the paper was thin and tough. The scale of the fold here is also smaller – a real challenge for my nerve-damaged and clumsy fingers.
Eric Joisel was a genius – his sense of fun and play was amplified by his seemingly accidental discoveries. He typified himself as a “bad folder”, but no one breathed life into paper quite like him. When cleaning out my display case, I chanced upon an ancient and beleaguered fold of an “adult” hedgehog, based on Joisel’s iconic design, and decided to fold a replacement:
Looking through notes Eric himself left about the “Baby Hedgehog”, I discovered his “design” was really an algorithm – do it on a 16 grid and you get a baby, do it on a 32 grid and you get an adult – it is an algorithm because the method of raising a quill is repeated along a row. The method of adding another rank of quills is the same. Baby hedgehogs have 5 ranks of quills, an adult had 9. The leg formation, head and tail formation on both models is the same … the instructions are algorithmic.
I set about using some of a red roll I bought off Amazon (for something else, then changed my mind) – it is a scant 60cm square. It is red both sides, and takes folds quite well. You lay a 16 grid or alternate mountain/valley folds. then Diagonal grids alternating mountain and valley – this has the side-effect of, mostly, orienting all the creases you need for the base correctly. Nice.
The first rank of quills to set is the middle line. You lay as many pre-rank pleats as the model dictates before forming the first row of quills, then, it is a simple zig zag squash/collapse. Raising subsequent ranks all use the same method – popping points by liberating an internal pleat and reversing a point that is hugging the previous line of quills.
I remember being bamboozled by the collapse back when I first did it over a decade ago, but with experience you can see the process, anticipate what needs to mode and achieve each point without stressing the surrounding paper- very satisfying. Once all ranks of quills are raised, the side fans are box-pleated in half to form front/back legs. You then do something Joisel terms “True 3D”, where the body is curved via gentle stretching of the points – this subtly alters the inner gussets and locks the body in a domed shape – it takes time and a gentle tough not to distort and damage the paper – the effect is lovely however.
If you have been paying attention, you would know i am a member of PAQ – Papermakers and Artists of Queensland. in 2025 we are mounting an exhibition that explores contemporary interpretations of the scroll, entitled “On a Roll”. I decided that I wanted to mount a FOLDED scroll as one of my submissions, and envisaged a massive tessellation:
I needed a theme, and a style. For a theme, I decided to try and “tell” the progression of the first year of the recent Covid-19 pandemic … because I could see a sequence of “blossoming” outbreaks that progressively “break” regular society.
The style choice was more complex – I love the aesthetic of Lacquerware – the Chinese/Japanese technique of covering simple materials in coatings of red lacquer, texture and patterns. I also wanted to have hints of “Kintsugi” – the Japanese technique of fixing broken pottery using lacquer and gold.
I chose red/natural Kraft paper because the red reminded me of the lacquer aesthetic, and the natural grounds the work in a common/everyday material. I selectively also introduced gilded elements into the finished folded work – symbolising the “patching” of the broken world – I went for a really minimal touch here, arguing less is more. Read further….
Doom-scrolling on Insta, as you do, I came across an astonishing reel by Kimiro, featuring a new design for a snake resting on a branch.
I was determined to fold some version of this design, but knew I did not have the paper (large enough) or the patience for a 128 grid (with partial 256ths) grid-based scaled-shaped model. So I scaled down – working out the minimum size scale I could reasonably shape consistently, then working out how much of a 70cm square duo sheet of Kraft would be the snake.
The design is ingenious – an 8-grid strip down the diagonal of a square becomes the snake, the rest of the paper becomes the colour-changed branch. One consequence of re-scaling the snake was that the paper allocated to the branch diminished to barely protruding from the snake’s body – so I thought “fuck it” and tucked it inside (like the layers of waste paper in a Ryujin) to give the body bulk, allowing me to fashion a lower jaw and forked tongue.
Another consequence of re-factoring the snek was that it’s overall length is diminished to almost comic proportions. This little guy is a grower, not a shower, indeed.
Accepting that the project was cursed from the beginning (by my lack of commitment đŸ˜› ) I decided to just go for it, treating the fold as an exercise in precision. Pre-creasing took an age, then scale collapse went smoothly. I then pre-creased all the scale-shaping also took an age, not nearly as long as the actual scale-shaping however. My Ryu Jin 3.5 PTSD returned at times, causing me to walk away from the project a few times.
Inspired by a friend and fellow folder (should out to @aboy021), I decided to throw a 60cm square at Alessandro Beber’s “Dasa Star”:
Carving a hexagon and laying in basic axial creases, initially the paper is collapsed into a tato (envelope) and then re-folded into a tato to form a pinwheel structure as the base.
Then, in a process reminiscent of the algorithmic fractal sequence of Shuzo Fujimoto’s “Hydrangea”, we go through processes of teasing paper until it is no longer free, then flipping over and feeding more paper through the middle structure in a “paper pump”, then flipping over and teasing again.
There are only a few origami figures I MUST have in my collection – Steven Casey’s “Echidna” is one of these:
This adorable little monotreme is covered in one of my favourite square-grid tessellations, but skillfully crafted to allow all the other body bits to be where they need to.
I bought the British Origami Society booklet describing how to fold this treasure as soon as I knew it existed, and have folded it a few times now. Some sequences are nightmare fuel – this one is just so enjoyable to fold.
I recently received a shipment of paper from Origami-shop.com and in it was a 65cm 11 colour pack of the NEW Shadow Thai paper. I last bought it in 40cm square form but it was THICK so to my delight this version is thinner and takes complex folds really nicely. I chose this fur-like colour because it most closely matched the quill and hair colour of an echidna.
Having folded Steven Casey’s 8×8 40 grid seamless chessboard and singularly failing to fold Marc Kirschembaum’s 40 grid because of crease-creep inaccuracies, I was approached by Daniel Brown and asked if I was interested in his chessboards – naturally I jumped at the chance. “Seamless” chessboards are deliciously more complicated because it required each square to be represented by an un-broken surface (as opposed to being able to be comprised of bits and pieces of layers – a much easier path):
A “clusterfuck” of seamless chessboards
I say CHESSBOARDS because Daniel has developed a series of coloured/white alternate seamless models of LOTS of sizes, and the skills necessary to migrate edge paper towards the centre to effect colour changes is a thing that needs some work and, often, particular “widgets” (or self-contained localised fold structures).
I started with the 4×4, rather efficiently designed on a 9×9 grid ( 0.444 efficiency). I had a piece of blue-white kami, so gave it a whirl. Even dimensions require different approaches for adjacent corners as they are different colours – the same colour corner exists on the diagonal.
Coupled to 8OSME, RMIT Design Hub is currently hosting an exhibition of important origami works called “Future Folds”. The opening event featured a panel discussion with Tomoko Fuse and Robert J Lang.
Panel discussions can be wonderful if the alchemy is right – the right combination of guests and questions. I am not sure we got a stellar set of questions posed, but it was encouraging to hear the guests speak of their obvious love of origami, and interesting to hear about their differing approaches to the artform.
We then proceeded to the gallery space to view a number of precious “holy grail” origami objects. Presented as the centerpiece was a large scale installation of Tomoko Fuse’s “OROCHI” (or large snake) – beautiful organic tube sculptures that seemed to have a life of their own.
Around the walls of the gallery were astonishing things, many of which I have only ever seen in documentaries and books – Tomohiro Tachi’s “Rabbit” for example. This was posited proof that using “Origamiser”, you can construct a crease pattern to replicate ANY 3d object using folds only. An amazing demonstration that would have been a nightmare to actually fold, but entirely possible to do so.
We saw some lovely examples of Jun Mitani’s curved fold works (some I have the CP of but have never successfully folded) and some original tree-maker inspired circle-packed designs for bugs and lobster from Robert Lang.
Present also were some lovely spiral forms and tessellations by Tomoko Fuse and an assortment of other precious folded things.
It is rare for such works to make it to Australia, and I was so glad to have been able to see them.
An unmissable opportunity presented itself where both OSME and Folding Australia conferences were to be hosted in Melbourne, Australia, one following the other. Having never attended an Origami conference (of any flavour) before, I jumped at the chance, but had little idea, really, what was ahead.
Diverse plenary lectures to start the days off
My wife and I got an Air BnB on Collins street for the week. Using the PT> train network, I travelled to and from Swinburne Uni for the international gatherings each day while Jo explored Melbourne Galleries and cafes.
I believed OSME stood for Origami, Science, Mathematics and Engineering – turns out the “E” was for Education, even though in this conference there were 2 Engineering strands … so, ok then. It seems the 8th iteration of this conference reflects origami/folding now so popular as an engineering concept.
I love the geometric world of Tessellations, and have folded many. It is doubly satisfying when you design that tessellation molecule and how it tiles yourself.
It does so by placing strategic dart pleats that seamlessly absorb the excess paper caused by the spike in a controlled and very flexible way. You can raise a spike at the intersection of a collection of creases (2 or more intersections). The folding gets progressively more fiddly the smaller the spike and the larger the number of intersecting lines.
I chose to derive a hex-spike, that is a 6-crease intersection spike molecule, based on a regular hexagon. Once I had derived all the creases necessary to allow one spike to be raised, I test folded it (just to check – theory and practice are sometimes at odds – some paper designs for origami seem to ignore the thickness of the paper which then breaks the symmetry or distorts the shape) and all was good.
Colour-change models are astonishing to me, designing models that use colour change are something special:
I have folded a number of different models like this, nothing quite like it however – what sets this model apart form any other is that each “tile” on the board is a seamless square.
Folding this from a SINGLE UNCUT square ends up being a bit of a brain-fuck. The paper was blue one side, white the other (actually cheap and nasty 70cm wrapping paper from my local dollar store). Distributing the “colour” is achieved, mostly, by bringing the sheet edges up through pleat bundles using a variety of techniques.
You can see the final location of the 4 corners of the original sheet in this development photo:
Planning/designing of a model like this is beyond me – pre-preparing the colour changes means that every bit of the paper has a job – either visible “tile”, spacer, flipper, mover etc to get the bits of colour to get where they need to go. Fold accuracy is the make or break of such designs – novices who use a “near enough is good enough” approach will not succeed here.
I was asked to test fold this, by Steven Casey, prior to publication. The diagrammed sequence is intense, starting with a 40×40 grid. Most of the folding is working on the wrong side, creating interacting pleat stacks that sit flat but that strategically manipulation pleat order. The run towards the “checkerboard” effect happens around the edges first, they they are migrated further towards the centre (although really only in a 4-unit strip around the periphery.
Tucked away in an inconspicuous corner of the deserted clearing, nestled almost invisibly among the leaf litter, the first signs of civilization were found in the form of a rough-hewn but definitely hominid-worked paper offering. For whom, to what, why … we shall never know:
Followers of the blog will notice occasional references to paper making pursuits. This post looks at the most recent results of a paper making workshop I attended in early July 2023. I had previously (back in 2019) been a member of PAQ (Paper makers and Artists, Queensland) but found full time work made attending events difficult. Now I am retired I have more freedom, so reapplied for membership.
The group’s interests in paper are diverse – from botanical paper making, monoprinting, encaustics, stitching, collage, pulp sculpture and more – my interests are (fairly narrowly?) folding, but it is important to have ones interests informed by a wider palette so I am very much the learner in that group.
Previous workshops I made sheets with finely beaten banana stem and cotton display board, day lily and lemongrass pulp, and still have some of the paper from that session. This session we pulped banana stem (coarsely this time) and mixed it with lemon grass, Philodendron, and South African Pigeon Grass stem, in various combinations. The pulp was added to water, then a suspension-aid made from water soaked chopped okra, which generates a mucilage that makes the vat water more goopy, helping the pulp to stay in suspension longer before settling out. The results were much coarser paper, but it presented an interesting challenge to see what I could fold from it.
I first pressed then dried my sheets, brought home still dripping. I carefully separated them from their couching sheets (old torn up bed linen) and selected sheets to process further. Using a fairly stiff batch of Methyl Cellulose, I stuck sheets to my glass and let them dry, reasoning (correctly it turns out) that the MC would make the sheets more pliable and bind the fibres more closely together (given some of them were very loosely bound, this seemed like a good plan).
