This Way Up Update.

Today I folded a couple more copies of the This Way Up box. The one made from Stardream text weight paper came out well.

The one I made from wet-folded card-weight Sorbet Duo was not so successful. The paper is just too bulky to look good.



This is one of my first experiments with wet-folding. It should really be called "damp folding" as a soggy piece of paper warps horribly. I lost a few good pieces of paper this way over the last couple of days.

Michale LaFosse recommends using a spray bottle to dampen the paper. This did not work very well for me. The bottle I purchased from the super-market was meant for cleaning fluids, not for plant misting. Even the finest setting was too coarse to provide an even non-blotchy film on the paper.

I discovered that a wrung-out common-or-kitchen-variety sponge wiped across the paper several times produced about the right dampness. I rinsed the sponge thoroughally first. This was fortunate as it was primed with some detergent. Check for this possibility if you aim to copy this method.

I used a large deep flat bottomed plastic tray to sit the paper in as I sponged it. After about a minute I transfered the damp paper to a large piece of plastic. This was cut down from a large zipper bag from which I had removed the zipper and the front section. This protected my Division Helper sheet. Trying to align wet paper on top of a printed card was obviously not going to work.

Dampening the paper certainly helped to avoid the cracks which can appear in card when it is folded. The method resulted in a very firm and stable set of modules.

Putting the modules together, however, was very difficult. The dampness prevented tears but the paper marred when bulky sections were dragged tightly across adjacent sections.

My conclusion is that card weight material is not suitable for this model, or for any other modular creation where assembly requires that several layers of material be squashed tightly together.

Success with card weight material is dependent on a suitable design which factors in the thickness of the paper, its strength and its spanning ability. This is what I did with my card weight "sox box". The design for this does not work with text weight material without a few adjustments.

This Way Up!

It has been a very busy week of folding and design.

The Fish Base Box has now been supplied with taller bases.










One version has become a "This Way Up!" Box.



Another version preserves the arrowhead and disguises the shaft in mono-color.
















There are now a number of alternative lids, all of which continue to be useful as bowls when upturned.

One of the variations takes inserts. The possibilities for these are apparently endless. While most of the inserts serve no purpose other than decoration, some can be used to hide flat material placed in the center of the lid while others can be used to hide material within themselves.


Another version of the lid has an alternative folding for the arrow head which avoids the difficult task of tucking in the side pieces accurately. In my opinion, it is not as neat as the original but this may not be an important consideration for a beginning or novice folder.

Other variations of the lid provide sleeker or more minimalist creasings. A couple of these can be put together to form a short box of their own. In this case, the folding paper needs to be a quarter inch narrower for the one which will form the base.

















Here are some generic crease patterns for the tall bases. I have not supplied crease patterns for the new lids as most of the variations are not difficult to figure out once you have made a model of the parent design.

Crease Patterns for the Fish Base Box

A reader requested a pattern for the Fish Base Box.

Here are CPs for the items shown in the photos in a previous posting: the main Lid and the Short Base box. Both are made from the traditional paper square and both begin with fish base foldings on two axes.

Photos and CPs for the other formats will follow. Diagrams will take longer and will probably be submitted for publication in an origami magazine or convention collection.

The Fish Base Box

Today I am continuing to diagram the Fish Base box and its variations. The original lid was rather loosely inspired by a very simple bowl design posted on an origami site in Europe. It would be hard to find obvious similarities between that design and what you see here but it kicked off the creative process.

My design progressed to include an alternative lid which allowed a decorative insert and three bases: one short and two long ones.