The tessellation that I folded prior to this one is what gave me the idea for this. I just kind of flipped things around and worked out how it would all fit together.  It took a lot triangles to construct. A. Lot. Of. Triangles.  Flagstone tessellations are generally very triangle intensive. This design is no exception.  The layout feels very familiar, but I searched and searched to see if I'd done it before based on someone else's idea and I couldn't find anything.  It's open back hexagons surrounded by trapezoids. That central idea repeats. There are some top-side triangles in order to make it a flat fold.  It's not the best time of year for folding flagstone tessellations. It's hot and humid. But inspiration is impatient. There are many triangles required on the reverse side. I knew there would be triangles needed on the back side, but I didn't anticipate needing quite so many of them during my initial conception of it.  But no worries, they were n...

 When I first started folding flagstone origami tessellation I did so using crease patterns generously offered to the internet by their respective creators. Peter Keller and Robin Scholz were the primary designers whose creations I folded.  In the beginning, it seemed so mystifying. How they'd arrive at the structure. How to execute the structure.  But it didn't take too long to understand how it worked and how to solve them and sometimes even create them.  In this case, I solved one. I saw a post by @kerstin.origami on instagram. She had folded a flagstone by @valleyfolder (Peter Keller). I liked it enough to give it a try.  The thing about flagstones is that once you understand the architecture, they're actually very easy to solve.  All the shapes are easily visible and how to connect them is a very straight forward process. Flagstones, are however, very labor intensive to actually fold. There are a lot of creases and there is a lot of coaxing involved....

 It was about time I tried to solve  someone else's tessellation again. So I saw a really interesting one by gatheringfolds on instagram. It's half hexagon and triangle twists. The front and back are mirror images of each other.  She named it Woven Strips.  The linear design style felt fresh and new.  It's a pretty easy to execute configuration. Nicely spaced. But this particular layout is something I really haven't come across before.  I especially  like how there are those step like parallelograms. They are the result of folding the mirror half hexagons (or trapezoids) on the other side.  20 lb copy paper was perfect for this. 

Came up with this configuration just screwing around with rhombus twists. When I first started mapping it out, I wasn't sure exactly where I could go with it, but I was sure I could take it somewhere meaningful. A little more fiddling later and the pattern coalesced.  It's rhombus twists around a hexagon, but they are a little different in that they overlap one another. Thus creating a different repeating pattern.  In order to flatly repeat the central idea, some triangle twists were necessary. From there, it was the simple matter of execution.  It was only mildly tricky to fold.  Thin paper worked just fine. 

I posted a tessellation a little while back that I called Hexagon Kisses Tessellation . It was a variation on a design by Arseniy K. This is a new variation on that idea. It compactifies the structure for a different finished product.  I've always been partial to denser designs for some reason. So that inspired this modification.  It's actually an idea I had a while back (before I'd encountered his) that for reasons I no longer recall, never came to fruition.  This time around it worked out just fine. It came together rather quickly and without much fuss at all.  The idea is simply hexagons with rectangles. To make the collapse work there are double width triangles. The corners of the hexagons fold over onto the points of the triangles.  I used 28 lb. paper. 

 This tessellation is what I call a natural one. Meaning there are no extra creases. Just those of the triangle grid itself. There are many interesting shapes and arrangements to be found even without cross creasing.  This kind of tessellation is a little less challenging. Once you fold the grid there are no additional creases required. The paper is also a little more receptive to being collapsed because of this.  When I conceived of this design I originally envisioned the second pic as the front of the design.  However, when I took the photos, I decided the other side would be the front.  The original inspiration was to have those wings off the central hexes create angular star shapes. But when I saw the other side of the design I thought it was much more intriguing.  Both sides are interesting in their own right.  I used pretty thin paper. 20 lb. copy paper. It worked out fine. 

 This tessellation builds off of my previous 'Collapsing Daisies' design. Where 'Collapsing Daisies' was just straight repetitions of elongated rhombus shapes, this one throws some straight edges and triangles into the mix.  It's a concept I came up with for flat folding shapes that don't naturally flat fold using classic twist techniques.  The collapse is dense and not easy to execute, but it offers the ability to do flat folds with shapes that you otherwise could not.  Crease pattern follows. 

 When I'm stuck for a new idea of my own, I'll usually just try to figure out how to fold someone else's. In this case I went with another one by Madonna Yoder @gatheringfolds.  Her designs are both beautiful and accessible. They provide some challenge, but not so much as to be frustrating.  I think she called this one shrinking violets. A pretty cool title for sure.  The concept of small hexagons on one side and larger open back hexagons on the other side is an intriguing one.  I kind thought of the same idea on my own, but never got to the point of creation.  Laziness prevailed, and instead, I just reverse engineered hers.  It's a lot easier to figure out someone else's finished idea than it is to fully realize your own concept.  On the plus side, I have found, that figuring out other origami designer's models provides inspiration for new ideas.  But for the time being, I have folded hers.  We'll have to see what comes next.

 This is a tessellation that I did several years ago. Looking back, I decided to give it another try. Just to see if I could improve upon the original execution.  Small hex twists on the back side and open back triangle twists.  It's an interesting weave pattern.  I tried a different backlight technique.  Used a lamp instead of a window.  It's a pretty basic idea, but I like the pattern.  It definitely came out better the second time around.  Crease pattern is below.  It's not complicated, so I just used ordinary copy paper.