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.

Even though there are only 5 columns, 4 rows of prickles (4 per bunch), this has taken me an age to fold. Tweezers were really necessary to maintain accuracy and to get into impossibly tight little corners. Accuracy in folding is important, but in this fold it is vital, else you do not get points. A few millimeters out and everything goes to hell.

I am thrilled to have been able to complete this fold, and to have folded it so cleanly is a testament to experience and patience. My only comment is that the size of the pot and the size of the Cactus – it looks like it would be pot-bound (and should be potted up in a larger pot.