Fold a Japanese Brocade
The Japanese Brocade is a traditional modular origami model. Six squares of paper are joined together to form a cube, which is then tweaked to form a ball.
Contents
Steps
Making the Individual Models
- Lay your first square of paper in front of you.
- Fold it in half horizontally.
- Open it up again.
- Fold the bottom edge upwards to meet the horizontal center-line. Repeat with the top edge so that the square now forms a rectangle.
- Take the bottom right-hand corner of your rectangle and fold it up to meet the middle of the top of the rectangle.
- Take the top left-hand corner of the rectangle and fold it down to the middle of the bottom of the rectangle.
- Open the whole model up again so that it becomes a square.
- Fold all four corners of the square in towards the two quarter-lines. Two of the corners should already have the folds necessary to do this.
- Fold the bottom of the square upwards to meet the quarter-line. (See picture.) Repeat with the top.
- Look at your model. You should see a line running from the top right corner to the middle of the bottom.
- Fold along this line. (This means the bottom right-hand corner will meet the quarter-line from the top.)
- Fold what remains of the bottom horizontally upwards along the quarter-line. This should push a piece of the model vertically sideways - fold this bit flat. (See the picture - this step is easier to demonstrate than to explain in words.)
- Rotate your model 180 degrees and repeat the previous three steps.
- Lift your top right-hand edge a little and you will see that there is a flap running underneath it.
- Push your top right-hand edge underneath this flap.
- Turn your model over.
- Fold the left-hand edge of the parallelogram in to meet the bottom right-hand corner.
- Fold the right-hand edge to meet the top left-hand corner so that the model forms a miniature square again.
- Make five more of the same models. If you wish, you can take three different colours of paper and cut two squares from each, so that in the end you will have six models in three different colours.
Putting the Models Together
- Push the triangle from one model under the flaps in the middle of the other model. (See picture.) Make sure you use two different coloured models.
- Take a model from the third colour and add it to the other two by pushing the triangles under the flaps.
- Continue joining the models together as shown in the photos by pushing the triangle part from one model under the interwoven flaps in the middle of another model. Make sure you put the same coloured models on opposite sides of the cube.
Turning the Cube Into a Ball
- Take those interwoven flaps in the middle of the cube between your thumb and forefinger and squash them together as shown in the picture. Make sure you have taken all four flaps together!
- Repeat on all sides of the cube.
- The Japanese Brocade is finished!
Tips
- Use the pictures. Origami is always easier to demonstrate than to explain!
- Be patient, origami takes practice and time.
- Once you've mastered origami, start showing your friends and sharing it with them. Chances are, people will love your origami.
Things You'll Need
- Six squares of colored paper
