High Density Hydrangea Origami Fold : Origami Tessellations

High Density Hydrangea Origami Fold

Recursive origami used to be something that I did on a regular basis. Long before I discovered origami tessellations, recursive origami was what I did.

Recursive origami is similar to tessellations in that they're both a repeating pattern that can, in theory, go on infinitely. But while tessellations repeat along the x and y axes, recursive designs repeat along the z axis.

Shuzo Fujimoto was a famous recursive origami designer. Some of his most famous creations are the clover and the hydrangea.

Some origamists even took it a step further with what are known as high density recursive designs. Repeating the single layered model multiple times on a single sheet of paper.

For some reason that I don't understand the technique for folding the hydrangea has stayed firmly planted in my brain. Even years later, I still remember all the steps.

I also remember that it can be done at higher densities. I first encountered this idea at a website called. origamitutorials.com. But I had yet to attempt it until now.

It felt daunting, but I went with a 3x3 iteration. For 9 total individual instances on the single sheet of paper.

By the time I'd collapsed the paper it was menacingly small.

Still, as I pressed onward, it was actually a lot easier than I thought it would be.

But I only did one level of repetition. It was too small after that to ever hope to go further.

I did not do the finishing tucks on the edges of the petals. I also only technically did 5 hydrangeas and left the in between areas at a step below.

I used ordinary printer paper trimmed to a 8.5 inch square. As I was folding, I got the feeling that some nice kami paper would've yielded a neater finished product. But I'm pleased with the final result.

However, if you have plans to try it, opt for a better paper than I did.

Comments

Infinite Triangles Origami Tessellation

This is just a flash idea I had. There was no planning involved. No inspiration. I just started folding and followed the lure of the creases in the paper. Upon seeing the finished result, It kind of reminds me of Robin Scholz's Triphilia tessellation, but the construction is definitely different and I was not thinking of that as I was crafting it. The similarity is that you can arrange the layering of the triangles into different patterns of your choice. I went looking and discovered I had folded this a few years ago and called it Triangle Temptations . I didn't realize this until after I'd completed this model. Apparently, according to my original post, I'd seen someone else fold it on flickr and recreated it. This happens sometimes. You hit on an idea and it's something you've done and forgotten. They linger in the back of your brain and come forward unexpectedly. That previous version differed from this one slightly, in that it used double sized cross g

Micro Rhombus Stars Origami Tessellation

This tessellation is micro rhombus star twists. I'm pretty sure I've seen this done with larger size rhombuses, but not with ones this size. They are the smallest natural rhombuses of the triangle grid. The center is achieved by collapsing a small hexagon. On the other side there are small hex twists and open back triangle twists. Since the shapes are rather small, it's a little bit difficult to fold. It's probably more of a cool weather tessellation. Humidity does the paper no favors on such small designs. But the ideas come when they do. Reverse view and crease pattern images follow.

What If Caviar Could Talk Variant

This origami tessellation is a variant of one by Arseniy K. He named his 'What If Caviar Could Talk'. After I had solved his design, I decided that I wasn't up to reproducing it exactly as he had folded his. Perhaps another time, in the future. So I changed things up a little to make it slightly less difficult. Both designs have a foundation of open back hex twists with triangle twists around them, He used micro rhombuses between the repeats. In my case, I used larger natural rhombuses instead. Still a difficult fold to execute, but much less so. It still required thick paper. I used tant folded into a 32 pleat triangle grid. You can see from the photo of the reverse side how densely packed everything is. It's a few layers deep. So be prepared to wrestle with that. My crease pattern for this iteration is included at the end. To fold his, sub out small natural rhombuses in place of my larger ones.

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