File this under “do try this at home”. Since Christmas I have been occasionally practicing Origami which has been a lot of fun. Origami, particularly unit-origami as you might think has some fairly strong roots in geometry and some exquisite forms can be produced with some surprisingly complex folds. Probably the best example of this is the Bisected Cube folded from a single sheet, the bisection is covered exactly by a 2nd sheet of paper folded into a perfect hexagon.

This past weekend I tried my hand at Kirigami. Kirigami is like Origami but cutting is allowed. Typically take one sheet of paper but you can combine multiple pieces as in unit-Origami.

This a cheap past-time and a lot of fun. I recommend a good cutting board, a fresh Xacto, some graph paper and plenty of quiet. I was going to publish up the patterns for these but I think that’d spoil it for the reader.

Here are some photos of the pieces I’ve cut and models I’ve folded. I find the animals far more challenging but not as mathematical or as satisfying.