This spring I fell in love with a book called the Icelandic Sjónabók which is a collection of traditional Icelandic patterns that are found in old Icelandic manuscripts. Because of the geometry and symmetry in the patterns I thought they might look good in origami. I did some experiments and the patterns came out nicely on models such as the traditional crane and the masu box. Then I selected six patterns I liked and were not too similar (in the Icelandic Sjónabók the same pattern often appears many times with slight changes) to work with. I wanted the colors to tone in with the old manuscripts and therefore chose tempered colors and had the paper offset-printed on mat paper.
The paper was printed at Guðjón Ó. ecofriendly printers and I must say their service is the best! They were really patient with me and my poor and heavy files that took hours to prepare for printing so I´m very grateful to them.
The final product is beautiful! Each sheet is 15 by 15 cm and the paper is 70 gr., a bit heavier than the commercial origami paper and very suitable for folding simpler models and modular origami models. In each pack there are 18 sheets, three sheets of each pattern, and a diagram for the traditional crane.
Below are images my friend Jóannes Pétur Héðinsson took of the paper and models made with it.
If you'd like to get your hands on the paper it's sold in Bóksala Stúdenta, Iða and Safnbúð Þjóðminjasafnsins or you could just drop me a line on idunnorigami@gmail.com
 |
| Traditional Icelandic Patterns |
Lastly, here is the diagram for the crane that is included in the packet. You can do all sorts of things with the cranes, such as to decorate gifts (and Christmas trees), make different types of mobiles, put them on sticks to use as cocktail pins, or even use them as book markers. Try it out, its great fun!
