Ullagami

Kirigami, Pop-up, Origamic Architecture, whatever you want to call it, I'm fascinated by what happens when you interrupt the surface of a sheet of paper.

25/06/2022

...and here's the other new small-format DIY template multi-pack I've just listed on Etsy. More half-scale bite-sized templates for your edification and amusement!

Where Pack IV focused on coplanar distortions, these models are all about convexity. They bulge and undulate, and are very satisfying to construct.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/1242844592/diy-templates-multi-kit-v-bulges

24/06/2022

Small template multi-packs are the most popular item in my Etsy shop, so I've just added two more of them! Here's one of them: kit IV, containing eight new small-format DIY template pdfs, all of coplanar patterns, for lots of cutting and folding fun.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/1242509098/diy-templates-multi-kit-iv-coplanar

15/02/2022

Maybe this is a lame way of going about it, but I don't know how to do long threads with interspersed images on fb, so here's a link to twitter. In this thread I talk about the flow of decision-making processes involved in producing three related pieces.

“Instead of just showing the pieces I just made, here's a thread about the process. First, I cut and folded one piece of paper. It collapses flat like a pop-up, which is what I originally designed it for, but now I have other ideas for it... /1”

18/10/2021

As promised, this is similar to the last model, except where that one had four 'sides', this uses 6. The resulting shape is rounder and wider, but still very swoopily contoured.

Half of these sheets, the 'yin' ones, are exactly the same, fold-for-fold, as my earlier 'Trisqorp' 180° model, only inside out. That is, these are the backs of those. You'd see the trisqorp if you could fit inside this construction. Then I designed a 'yang' piece to fit it top and bottom, so that they would fit together continuously.

6 sheets of paper, folded and sewn together, 53cm high not including the base.

15/10/2021

Here's the one that fell in the pool, remade. 53cm high, 4 sheets of paper cut, folded, and sewn with linen thread.

This is exactly the same — fold for fold — as an earlier model I posted, but I think it looks nicer stretched to this proportion. A little bit of relative convexity is lost in the distortion, but perhaps it's more elegant.

And now I'm thinking: if it looks cool with 4 pieces, maybe I'll try for 6... I mean, more is always better, right? Stay tuned.

30/09/2021

This is what it looks like when you make a tall and elegant new piece, a stunning 53cm high, and then when you bring it outside to show someone, the wind blows it into the pool before you can photograph it. Note to self.

It kind of looks like Tenniel's Red King. I wonder what it's dreaming about?

21/09/2021

The cityscape on the dining room table keeps growing, and glitters at night. For clouds, a mesh of overlapping shadows. Quite the scenic metropolis.

20/09/2021

as requested by someone on twitter, here's what that last one looks like lit from within. the light is on the bottom, so the fun shadows appear on the ceiling.

18/09/2021

Finally made a turntable video of Sqorpelisk-3. I really like how swoopy and curvy this model is, maybe I'll try for a taller version of the same idea.

4 sheets Canford paper, linen thread. Again of course if I had a scaled-up working environment, this could be folded from a single sheet.

Also the plastic proto-base I printed needs to be re-imagined in wood.

17/09/2021

While it was not my intention to produce Judaica on Yom Kippur, nonetheless this is what I inadvertently made yesterday. Makes a nice star when viewed from above. Coincidence? I wonder...

It's six sheets of paper cut, folded, and sewn together with linen bookbinding thread. It stands a very proud 51cm high.

Also, it's pictured here upside down... those little flags on the top are meant to be where it anchors into a wooden base (which I haven't made yet).

17/08/2021

Claude Evans takes more amazing photos... such a variety of senses of the same model from various angles.

30/07/2021

More gorgeous photos of some free-standing Ullagami models, with a huge thanks to Claude Evans for his photographic skills!

Address

Ullapool
IV26

Website

http://www.ullagami.com/

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life by 1000 cuts?

A few years ago my family and I moved to northern Scotland, where the winters are long and the nights seemingly without end. And so, in order to beguile the many hours of darkness, I began working with paper. I had been experimenting with origami for over a decade, but here I quickly moved on to kirigami, fascinated by the possibilities I found available by interrupting the folded surfaces that origami generally likes to keep intact.

The parameters I set for myself were simple: each model should collapse folded flat when completed; and each model should be created from a single sheet of paper — nothing should be added or removed, but rather the surface of the paper should be rearranged without loosing a shred of its area.

Beginning with simple building-block designs, the pieces evolved further and further within the limits of my basic parameters, and my manual and mathematical abilities.

The name Ullagami is a portmanteau; it is a mixture of origami and kirigami, and because the village I live in is called Ullapool. It wasn’t until I decided to create a Japanese “chop” to stamp the backs of the pieces I was constructing that I learned, quite by surprise, that the transliteration of “ullagami” into Japanese is ウラガミ, which literally means “the back of the paper” — exactly where I wanted to put the stamp! Perfect! A very happy accident indeed.