This is something I got out of the awe inspiring tessellations book by Eric Gjerde. When I'd done all the standard tesses, I decided to try a few mini versions. A series of interconnected hexagons and triangles populate the paper. I used a very small square and the mini version came out pretty good.   I've been working on a few new tessellation ideas of my own as well as crease patterns. While I'm always up for creating some new designs, mapping the process is a challenge. Still, it amazes me that a year ago I wouldn't have thought it possible to fold such an intricate tessllation on any size paper, let alone such a small one. Yet, there it is.

Here's a new origami tessellation I just recently folded. I had been playing with the central design for a while and finally figured out how to make the edges work nicely with it. It came out a lot nicer than I thought it would. When it's back lit it really has a beautiful appearance.  It begins with a small center hexagon. That is surrounded by rhombus twists all flowing together in the same direction. Here's the interesting thing about this design. I can't explain the math behind it, but because the rhombus twists flow off of a central hexagon twist I was able to to fold them over 2 pleats in the clockwise direction of the central hexagon twist. The arms connecting the center to the edges in the back lit photo show this quite clearly. This surprised me since they were only twisted one pleat along their other axes. This is what allowed for all six of the rhombuses to flow in the same direction and lie so close together as they do. The outer edge rhombuse...

Here is a miniature version of the classic origami spread hex tessellation. I began with a fairly small square of paper and folded the traditional triangle grid on it with 32 pleats. The square was derived from a standard 8.5 x 11 piece of printer paper. That was trimmed to a square. Then that square was divided into four small squares. It was from one of those that this was folded. When I originally became interested in origami tessellations it was because of the spread hexagon tess. It intrigued me so much. I was determined to fold it myself. There were several failed attempts before I finally caught on to the rhythm its construction. It was finally coming to understand that design that opened up the whole world of origami tessellations to me. Suddenly they all made sense. Or most of them anyway. It's a beautiful design that belies its underlying simplicity. What I love about it most is that it's a paradox. It's both complex and simple. That is, to me, the appeal of all...

Origami is both the ultimate relaxation and the ultimate frustration. Tessellations, I think, are the epitome of that. I love them and hate them. But I love them more than I hate them. Another Eric Gjerde design. It was in his tessellations book, but at the back without instructions. It wasn't too difficult to figure out the basic architecture. I just seem to have trouble with the laying out the repetitions. A 32 pleat grid is pretty much the limit of my patience. But a lot of designs call for at least 48 pleats. So I try to squeeze things together. Or settle for partial iterations. I worked out the gist of it, but I may have done the spaces between the 'flowers' differently. Turned out rather nice though. It's all a learning experience. 

Here's a neat origami tessellation that I created. The back of each 'flower' is a small hex twist. Then I went to the other side of the paper to do the petal shapes. It was a little difficult as all the axes didn't flow together nicely. So there were some inversions of folds involved to make them all play nicely together. It worked out well in the end though. I'm quite pleased with the results. The original concept was created on a small grid in  a single module like the unit shown at center. That single module was flipped and mirrored as necessary to facilitate creating the ones which surround the center. I only left as little space as was absolutely required between each iteration because I wanted to fit as many repetitions as possible into the 32 pleat grid. .  Where the folds for the repeating petals did not line up I was forced to get creative and do some reversing of the pleats. To make everything lay flat any conflicting folds were a combination of a ...