The Art of the Fold: One-Sheet Books, part 1

Welcome to the fourth entry in my series of posts detailing my adventures working through Hedi Kyle and Ulla Warchol‘s new book, The Art of the Fold: How to Make Innovative Books and Paper Structures. This post focuses on half of the structures included in chapter three, One-Sheet Books. By the way – these are not made from bed sheets, but from one sheet of paper (I’m guessing you knew that already).

One-sheet books are awesome for teaching kids in the classroom because they don’t require a lot of supplies. Complexity of the structures can vary, so be sure to tailor the project to your age group.

If you’re new to my blog, then you should know that I’ve been posting my structure of the day on Instagram, so be sure to follow me there. You can click on the name of each structure below and you’ll be taken to its related post over there. No pressure though – as you can see by this post, I’m also writing roundups on my blog on a biweekly-ish basis.

Holy sheet, here we go!

18. Franklin Fold
Not only is this structure made from one sheet of paper, but both the pages and the cover are integrated/attached. I used a double-sided sheet of paper to add interest to my model. Hedi chose dimensions for the starting sheet of paper that were approximately in proportion to those of the golden rectangle. Hedi writes that the structure was inspired by a series of drawings in Benjamin Franklin’s On the Art of Swimming. 

19. Triangular Book
Oh, how I love this structure. The book is made from a square piece of paper, which makes it super easy to scale. The cover isn’t integrated like with the Franklin Fold. First the cover piece is cut out of the center and then the remaining paper is folded into a triangular accordion. Slits are cut inside the cover and the first and last pages of the text block are woven through them to complete the book.

20. Four-Way Map Fold
I think I’d enjoy navigating during road trips a lot more if maps were actually folded like this – it’s a very satisfying structure to open and close. This structure is reminiscent of the Turkish Map Fold, the main difference being that the map is divided into four sections that can be opened independently of one another. The folding process for this one is a bit of a thinker. There’s a whole lotta triangle folding and inside reversing going on.

21. Fishbone Fold
When you open this book by pulling on the center tab, you get a satisfying sensation as the sections pop open. The structure requires text weight paper and I recommend using one on the softer and lighter side – it moves much more fluidly if your paper isn’t stiff.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the first four structures in the One-Sheet Books chapter of The Art of the Fold: How to Make Innovative Books and Paper Structures.

There are four more structures in this chapter, so the next post will involve changing the sheets. Yeah, I know that was bad.