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Showing posts from July, 2023

Solving Minty Flowers Origami Tessellation

 Recently, I purchased some tant paper on amazon. I was skeptical about whether or not it would work better for more complex tessellations. I was pleasantly surprised with how well it facilitated a small and intricate design.  This tessellation was my first time using it and I am quite happy with the final result.  I used it to fold 'Minty Flowers' tessellation by Arseniy K. It worked beautifully.  As far as solving the design, the shapes and techniques were all quite familiar and it came together quickly. It's an elegant pattern that I quite like. And thanks to the fancy paper, it was a pleasure to actually fold it.  The tessellation consists of micro rhombuses around small hex twists.  There are small triangle twists adjacent to the rhombuses and those lead into offset hex twists on the other side.  I did create a crease pattern sketch which I will include at the end.  You can see from the photo of the reverse side below that everything is prett...

Origami Tessellation : Changing Gears

 The start of this tessellation was the idea I had for surrounding open back hexagons with long rectangles. It was from there that I had to figure out how to make it tessellate.  Mapping it out on some grid paper revealed that another open back hexagon with very closely nestled triangles could work to fill in the gaps.  Tessellations such as this utilize a combination of collapsing and twist folds.  Collapsing folds use the grid to compress the paper into smaller shapes.  In this case most of the work is collapsing. But there is some twisting necessary regarding the triangles close to the hexagons. Collapsing tessellations is an entirely different avenue of execution that can help you construct totally different patterns with the same common shapes.  Depending on how you conceive of them, they can be quite simple or quite complex.  In this case, it's of intermediate difficulty.  For further insight into how this tessellation and other collapsing f...

Origami Tessellation Chasing the Rain

 The inspiration for this tessellation came from thinking about another tessellation by Arseniy K called 'Paper Planes'. The triad of short wide triangles that he used in that was just stuck in my mind. That's how I arrived at this design.  It uses the same triad of those triangles, but wraps them around a completely different set of shapes.  On the front along with the triangles triads are a kind of offset pyramid.  On the other side there are small triangle twists and blunt tipped pyramids.  The photo of the reverse side shows this quite clearly. The crease pattern I have included at the end will also show it more clearly.  It's a bit tricky to fold, but not too terribly difficult. 

Solving Origami Star Tess 2.0

 This is one of my own tessellations that I originally created back in August 2017. I called the original design Origami Star Tess when I posted it here. Way back then, I didn't keep crease pattern sketches or diagrams on how I had folded something. So, I actually had to solve my own creation. Kind of adds a new level of pressure knowing it was my brain that came up with it in the first place. Felt like I had to be able to figure it out.  I did remember that the points were made with rabbit ear sink folds. However, I couldn't remember how I made the central hex star.  A little experimentation later, I realized it was a weird kind of collapsing hex twist that I haven't really used since then. That starting point facilitates the cascade of points that flow out from it. Without the right central starting point, the side corners of the points won't align properly with each other.  There are other center shapes that could be used, but this is the one that I chose.  ...

Laughing Serpents

 This tessellation is based on the center of a Joel Cooper suncatcher design. My spacing is different though.  I actually got the idea from an instagram post by Monika Hankova where she used the same central starting point.  It's open back hexagon twists with rhombuses situated as to form the 'arms'.  Some triangles are needed in the back spaces between the hexes and the rhombuses.  The larger negative spaces are blunt cornered pyramids.  In my case, it's a fairly straightforward tessellation. I chose to do it this way specifically because the humidity would not cause problems folding it.  In the case of Joel's tess, I really couldn't make out what  else was happening from the flickr photo he had posted.  In the case of Monika's rendition, I still have plans to solve the rest of the design at a later date.  My solution for how to fold what I've folded is included at the end of this post. 

Solving Throughline Origami Tessellation by GatheringFolds

 Here's an interesting linear design of rhombus and triangle twists. As it was noted in the title, this design is by Madonna Yoder (who is known as gatheringfolds online).  It's a mirror symmetry tessellation. This means that the front and back are mirror images of each other. Knowing this before you begin solving a tessellation can be helpful in discovering the solution. The front of the design is rhombus twist and open back triangle twists.  The other side is the same reversed.  This point is further illustrated by comparing the first image and the second image (the front and the back respectively).  It's an intermediate level fold that you can do without too much fuss.  My crease pattern sketch is included at the end. 

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.