Book Review: ‘Fold & Explore Curved Origami Tessellations’ by Winnie Leung and Ilan Garibi

• Title: “Fold & Explore Curved Origami Tessellations”
• Authors: Winnie Leung and Ilan Garibi
• Publisher: Independently published (July 14, 2024)
• ISBN-13: 979-8332495557
• Binding: Paperback, perfect binding
• Pages: 156
• Printing: Full color

I felt honoured to be asked to review this book, as it’s not an area of origami that I have much experience in. I’ve dabbled with a few tessellations and corrugations before, but I wouldn’t say it was a strong point of mine. Ilan was keen that I review it, and I have to say, I’m most impressed, not only with the quality of the book but also the finished folds that I’ve been able to make.

The book is nicely presented, with a gloss lamination on the cover. It measures approximately 22×28 cm, and about 1-cm thick, with a perfect binding (pages glued along the spine). It is lavishly illustrated with crease patterns and many beautiful photos of the curved tessellations. As is the norm with books by Garibi Productions, it’s clearly laid out, with an easy-to-read typeface. What’s particularly nice about the presentation is that the majority of the pages are a light fawn color, reducing eye strain and also helping those with dyslexia. It’s typeset in the Trade Gothic Next Pro font, in approximately 12-point type. To get a good feel for the layout of the book, I recommend having a look at the preview, available from the “Read sample” feature on Amazon.

The Dedication, Acknowledgement and Preface are followed by a table of Contents, listing seven chapters: Introduction, Linear Corrugation, Curved Variations on the Cube Tessellation, Squares and Crosses Variations, Generalising, Resch, Beyond the Basics and Appendices. It’s worth noting that although the book does include many crease patterns and much discussion, it’s not a book of diagrams but more a guide on how curved tessellations can be made, encouraging the reader to experiment with the techniques discussed. All crease patterns presented can be downloaded as SVGs that can be used either to make embossing or scoring templates or with a digital cutter. (See the downloadable samples below.)

I spent many hours, marvelling at the photos of the completed tessellations. It’s hard to know where to start, but the models are presented approximately in order of complexity, so I chose to fold three from the second chapter. Paper recommendations are given in the introduction, highlighting that your paper choice should be single color, have a medium-or-greater thickness/weight and a medium-to-high stiffness. Many of the examples appear to be folded from Elephant Hide, but I decided to use white 160 gsm card stock, at least for my tests. I’m sure that I’m not alone, but I save nice papers for “special” projects and rarely actually fold with them … I really must start using them!

I used my digital cutter (a Silhouette Cameo 5), to precrease the patterns that I chose, using an Electrostatic Mat and a fine-point embossing tool. I used the default settings, selecting “Score and Emboss Paper” as the material for the second tool carriage and changed the order of operations to emboss first, then cut out the square. It’s worth noting that you can also use a standard blade, to cut only part way through the material (instead of embossing), but you may have more difficulty creating the valley folds from the scored side of the paper. Having said all of that, the appendices do explain how you can make scoring templates from a thicker piece of cardboard and use these to score or emboss your paper manually, so a digital cutter certainly isn’t a requirement when using this book.

The first model that I folded was a regular corrugation, the Fish-Bone tessellation, so that I could practice. After a little time encouraging the embossed lines to follow the correct direction (mountain or valley), I ended up with this:

Fish-Bone. Folded by Edward Holmes.

I think I probably squashed the model a little too much, as some of the creased edges telegraphed through to other faces, but we live and learn.

The next models I folded were curved, Falling Curtain and Growing Up, Growing Down. I’ll be the first to admit that it wasn’t easy, but after much time spent with my tongue sticking out, I got there, and I’m satisfied with my results, especially considering that this is my first time folding this type of model ... You know what they say: Practice makes perfect.

Falling Curtain (left) and Growing Up, Growing Down. Folded by Edward Holmes.

To summarize, “Curved Origami Tessellations” is a nicely presented book that contains a large selection of models, each accompanied by clear photos, crease patterns, plus written discussion about the design of the model and folding hints. The tessellations range from simple to complex. This book is available worldwide through Amazon and covers the folding of many dozens of curved tessellations, too many to count, but more importantly, it gives you the tools needed to design your own curved tessellations. I’d highly recommend this book, even to those who haven’t explored tessellations and corrugations before.

Sample Crease Patterns to Download

Try your hand at these crease patterns reprinted from the book with permission of the authors. Click to download a PDF or to view an svg to download from your browser.