The calendar is basically a grid of 7 x 8 cells. Each cell contains a cube corresponding to that particular day. The cube has a red and a black and white side. You can indicate the current day by turning the cube to the red side. For a new month, you rearrange all the cubes […] Read more

Here is the 2024 update for the dino calendar.  For 2024, I have also added a new color scheme for the dino – dark gray with lime green highlights: Dino crafting template – dark gray 2024 edition Here are the downloads: 2024 monthly calendar cards (2 pages) 2024 weekly calendar cards (9 pages) I wish […] Read more

Here is the 2023 update for the dino calendar.  Here are the downloads: 2023 monthly calendar cards (2 pages) 2023 weekly calendar cards (9 pages) I wish all of my dear readers a happy and prosperous year 2023!  And here are the previous installments: 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2022 Read more

Here are the brand new 2022 calendar pages for the dino calendar. My sincere apology for not updating the calendar for 2019 through 2021! This was an extremely busy time for me, with a lot of personal things I had to attend to, and I just didn’t find the time to take care of the […] Read more

So my son had his tenth birthday recently, and what with the Coronavirus induced shutdown and self-isolation/quarantine, a real birthday party with his friends was of course no option. Thus, I set out to organize a virtual birthday party in Minecraft instead. What’s the difference to just playing together online? Well, for one thing I […] Read more

Some of you have already asked when the 2018 update for the dino calendar will go online. Well, ask no more, because here it is: The 2018 edition comes as a plain white template – ready to be colored in by you. A lot of you folks have asked recently about black and white templates […] Read more

Now, here is something for scifi movie aficionados: K’s toy horse from Blade Runner 2049, recreated as a papercraft project. Comes complete with the date inscription at the bottom, of course... Read more

About ten years ago I joined my wife and in-laws for a trip to the attic of the old family house. This was an attic close to what you would expect from a mystery thriller: Dark, extremely dusty, barely protected against the elements, with wind and light coming in between the loosely fitting old window […] Read more

A lot of you have asked for a 2017 update for the dino calendar. Well, finally here it is. In case you don’t know what I am talking about, this is it: A nice little stegosaurus, which holds monthly or weekly cards, where each card’s tab doubles as one the blades of the stegosaurus. The […] Read more

Recently my kids inherited a very old children’s microscope, which had been used in elementary school. As these low budget microscopes go, it’s resolution and chromatic fidelity were abysmal, and despite featuring a decent nominal magnification of x500, it was more or less a glorified magnifying glass. It’s really difficult to get reasonable images out […] Read more

For a kids’ church activity, my wife recently asked me whether I could create a Baal bust (don’t ask!). This is what I came up with: It looks surprisingly good, considering that it is made entirely from cardboard. I used gold-colored acrylic paint, which turned out excellent, and makes it seem very solid. It’s only […] Read more

For my daughter’s last birthday, we had some of her friends for a sleepover party. Before bedtime, I wanted to use this opportunity to do something that only works after dark: A scavenger hunt in the dark. In preparation, I requisitioned: A blacklight flash light A UV marker pen An infrared LED array A package […] Read more

Here is a deviation from my usual papercraft content: A web application I recently created. It’s an ‘allowance bank’ for kids. The idea came to me when I was on a trip with my own kids. They wanted to buy something, and I knew they had some money back at home in their piggy bank, […] Read more

Here is a very nice project in which I took part. It's a new papercraft book, beautifully illustrated by the very great Mina Braun, an incredibly talented illustrator. I was asked to do some papercraft designs for Mina's illustrations, and was very grateful for the enjoyable collaboration. Read more

Here is a brand new card game I designed, helping you (and your kids) to practice your arithmetic skills. Math monsters is easy to play but challenging, and great fun. At the moment, I am having Math Monsters professionally printed as a high quality, glossy 55-cards deck. Currently, there is a pre-order phase with a 50% […] Read more

Recently my 5 year old son drew a sketch of a computer game concept he had come up with. The game would be about a cake factory, and the goal simply would be to make as many delicious cakes as possible. Here is his drawing: Well, looking at the drawing and the nicely laid out […] Read more

You always wanted to be the mayor of a sprawling, vibrant city? Here is your chance with this desktop city: A collection of tiny buildings and vehicles that is easy to build and looks great on even the smallest space. Read more

Get your very own, totally customized wedding album coloring and activity book! Yes, you heard it right: You can get a 16-pages coloring and activity book filled with color-in pictures of the bride and groom, the family, and other wedding guests. Based on photos you send me, I will create detailed outlines by hand and merge them with the illustrations of the album. Read more

As promised, here is the 2016 update for the dino calendar. This includes the weekly and monthly cards as well as a brand new color edition: For 2016, I went with a classic beige/gray. But of course, you can build your dino in any of the existing colors – the templates are at the bottom of […] Read more

Everyone loves robots, right? The nice robots of the good old days, of course, not some shape-shifting terminator bent on the destruction of mankind. So since Christmas is drawing near, for those of you who can’t wait, here is a vintage robot advent calendar. You can buy the whole set, but there are also three […] Read more

Want to give your kids something other than candy for an advent calendar? Why not a papercraft project. This one is for a winter village, and it contains 24 easy to make buildings. From a tiny shed to the village church, some are big, some are small, but all are cute and snowy. One reader, Mike, […] Read more

Here is a set of 26 box templates, one for each letter of the alphabet, available from my Etsy store. They make a nice wrapping for a personalized gift. You can use them for initials, spell a whole name or even a little message: Here is a video for a closer look: They are about […] Read more

These 20-sided dice show the numbers 1 to 10 (each two times). By using two, you can easily have your kids practice multiplication tables from 1 to 100. Make two dice, roll them, and calculate the product. Or, if you use three dice, you can practice divisions as well: Roll two for the two digits […] Read more

This is a pop-up book about a very important topic: Vaccines. Vaccination is the most effective measure against preventable infectious diseases. Unfortunately, a lot of people are worried about possible side effects and too few are aware of the very serious consequences of supposedly ‘harmless’ diseases such as measles. Here is a video of the […] Read more

Just in time for Halloween, here is a little skeleton kitty. This one is not difficult to build, so have a go and let the ghost cat gaze deep into your soul. Read more

A miniature guitar - a nice accessory for a doll or plush toy. If you are patient enough, you can use real threads as strings. Read more

A very primitive, yet effective way of getting moving pictures, the kinematoscope was the ancestor of movie projectors. Turn the hand crank, and it animates the contained image cards into an animation, using persistence of vision, similar to how a flip book works. Read more

Low poly design is quite popular these days. Luckily, it’s actually not that difficult to do, since it effectively is the reduction of complex forms into something much simpler and a bit abstract. This is why last weekend I set out to doing a low-poly bullfinch: For my German readers: Den Dompfaff gibt’s auch auf […] Read more

Jonah and the whale is a story almost 3000 years old, but it hasn’t lost its fascination. For a children’s church project, I designed this whale and Jonah, who fits into the whale’s maw: This proejct is not difficult to build. Here are brief instructions on how to do it: All flaps and accompanying opposite […] Read more

Using your phone in your car has almost become a necessity, for better or worse. Naturally, the accessories industry has come up with a plethora of adapters and phone holders. But what if you are in a car that you use only temporarily, where you can’t install a holder permanently? Enter the phone – cup […] Read more

Many papercraft printables are not accessible to younger children – they require motor skills that only come with age. At the same time, papercrafts are a perfect pastime for young children: They teach important construction and manual skills in a playful way, let children learn about shapes and geometry, and they provide a lot of space […] Read more

Sometimes state-of-the-art manufacturing and old school crafting techniques go together surprisingly well. In an attempt to marry 3D printing and papier mâché, I created a raster scaffold of an elephant (based on this thing). You might consider this a sculpture in and of itself, but I wanted to use it as the basis for a more […] Read more

  Here is another miniature airplane, the Lockheed Hercules C-130:   The C-130 is a versatile transport aircraft. It was designed to be able to use unprepared runways. Due to its robustness and versatility, it is used in more than 40 variants all over the world. The aircraft has remained in continuous production for more […] Read more

Which child doesn’t dream of their own little empire? This project is a step in that direction: Banknotes, coins, and stamps carrying the picture of your child. I have created a a set of five phantasy banknotes (5, 10, 20, 50, and 100), seven coins (2, 1, 0.50, 0.25, 0.10, 0.05, 0.01), and three stamps (0.05, […] Read more

Upon popular request, I have updated the original dino calendar for the year 2015. Not only that, but I have created a new violet variant for the new year. You can find the new template below, as well as templates for weekly and monthly cards. The original, green, dino can be found here, and there is […] Read more

Something for astronomy geeks: Our solar system as a DIY papercraft kit. The set contains all eight planets, sad little pluto who not too long ago got demoted to 'dwarf planet', and - of course - our home star, the sun. Read more

  Continuing from the Blam! experiment, here is the next 3D typography:   And again, it’s not exactly easy to build. In fact, this one seems slightly more difficult than Blam! Anyway, here is the template: PDF template   Read more

Here is a somewhat random object: The model of a molar tooth in paper.   I made this primarily to test my workflow for creating semi-realistic models with a low enough number of polygons so that they actually can be built. Still, even with the simplified form, this model is a bit difficult to make. […] Read more

You may remember the paper maneki-neko or lucky cat I made a while ago. Today, I made an update to the design – meet grumpy maneki-neko. (Disclaimer: Although this is an infinite loop, since the model is not motorized, in reality, the arm stops after a few swings). She (did you know grumpy cat is […] Read more

Halloween is coming up in a few days, and here is an appropriately themed pair of models: It’s Dr. Frankenstein and his monster. And since there are still some people out there who think the monster’s name is Frankenstein, the two have donned tee shirts that explicitly make clear who is who. By the way, the name […] Read more

This is a butterfly case (you know, the kind biologists and collectors create, with dead butterflies mounted on pins), but instead of dead butterflies, I used tiny paper airplanes: If you want one of these, check out my Etsy store. The eight airplanes are rather famous: The Supermarine Spitfire was a very popular British fighter plane […] Read more

We recently spent a few very nice days at the sea. I knew there would be a beach with very neat sand, and so I prepared some toys for the kids. Before I go into details, I should mention that a short while ago I bought a 3D printer kit (which, by the way, works […] Read more

And finally, after Blam! and Yeah, we end the 3D typography series on a somewhat darker note: Argh, it’s already sinking… This one, as opposed to Blam! and Yeah, consists of six different pieces that need to be set up correctly. If that’s too cumbersome for you, I suggest gluing them to some support. Here […] Read more

Recently, I started experimenting with 3D typography in the form of bold, blocky words. Here is the first result: I have to admit that this model is somewhat difficult to build: The shape of the letters, when extruding into the third dimension, form a lot of nooks and crannies. If you still want to try […] Read more

A free template which you can customize with a QR code pointing to your website (or twitter, facebook, whatever you desire). Just enter a text, click the button and download the PDF. Read more

Here is a silly little idea I had for Easter: Egg hats. They actually turned out quite nicely, and are a nice touch to colored or plain eggs. And they are made completely from paper. We have: … the top hat for the distinguished egg head:       …the fedora, for eggs of fashion: […] Read more

Here is something for kids learning basic math: The groceries game is about going to the supermarket and shopping for everyday groceries. So how does it work? First of all, this is not a competitive game. There is no winner or loser. You just buy and sell items to your co-players. However, I found that […] Read more

    This was a commissioned work I did for a company, as promotional items for a trade show. The idea was to provide easy, precut templates that would fold into origami-like animals effortlessly and without glue. We wanted to give people something they could play with, even if they had never done any kind […] Read more

Even in this day and age of velcro, kids should learn how to tie their shoelaces. You can use a real shoe for that, but depending to what extent that shoe was in use before, this can get a bit messy. I have created a little learning tool for my kids: It’s basically a flat […] Read more

This is a dynamic paper model: A cipher machine I call 'the cryptograph'. I tried to give it a little bit of a steampunk look. It works by switching between multiple encryption alphabet tables, using internal binary switches and a marble. Read more

  Just made the latest addition to the Cubicity set: A female scientist. This was a custom request by a reader, Trudy, who rightfully felt that women were a bit underrepresented in Cubicity. So, here she is:   She has a beaker in her other hand, which makes her both a chemist and a physicist […] Read more

Here is a set of very educational paper toys: The numbers from 1 to 10. Not just simple numbers, though - these come with a trick: Each number has a length proportional to it's numeric value. So two is double the length of one, three is 1.5 times longer than two, and so on. That means that it's very easy to do math with these numbers, in particular subtractions and additions. It's so easy, in fact, that my 3 year old son (who knows what the numbers look like, but can't actually add or subtract) spontaneously started doing math with them. Read more

Many of you seemed to really like the shelf-sitting guy I recently posted. Which prompted me to make this couple, just in time for Valentine’s day:   It’s actually just as easy as the original model (well, you have to make two of them). Here is the template: PDF template couple And if you feel […] Read more

I wanted to have a simple, easy to build mascot that I could use in header graphics for Twitter and Google+. It's a shelf sitting cube guy. This one is really easy to make, so feel invited to download the PDF template. Read more

Remember the businesscard holders from 2011, the butler and the scientist? Well, as requested by my daughter and the son of a good friend of ours, I had to make two new ones. I hesitate to call them business card holders, as the design makes it a bit unlikely that they will be used for […] Read more

This post is about a design not done by me, but by Kate from minieco. I stumbled upon these delightful paper diamonds some time ago, and was amazed by their elegant simplicity. The shape is just perfect, and they make for truly beautiful toys. I built some myself for my kids, and they loved them very much. They are surprisingly sturdy for paper toys, due to a very clever folding pattern. Read more

A lot of people have asked me if I will provide 2014 cards for the stegosaurus calendar. Good news: I finally managed to update the cards. (Den Kalender und die Karten gibt’s auch auf Deutsch, und zwar hier) I have made monthly and weekly cards, so you can choose according to your preference. Speaking of […] Read more

A nice little paper toy gun, marrying peaceful hippie style to the lethal force of frontloaded 17th century muskets. Read more

Here is a kind of ‘interactive’ model and actually quite a nice toy: A ‘working’ instant camera made from paper:   So, what do I mean by working? Well, you can turn the crank on the right-hand side and the camera will output a picture you have taken. The mechanism is robust enough to work […] Read more

A machine made from paper which multiplies any two numbers between 1 and 10, using marbles. The path of the marbles throught the machine is a little Rube Goldberg-esque but great fun to watch, and the machine is very helpful in conveying the concept of multiplication to young students. Read more

I haven’t posted in a long while, and the reasons are twofold: First, my job is currently keeping me extremely busy, which hopefully is a temporary problem only. And second, I am currently working on a papercrafting project that is much more complex than originally anticipated. I hope it will soon see the light of […] Read more

Just in time for the end of this year (and Christmas, in case you want to make this as a gift for someone), I have updated the stegosaurus calendar (you will find the template for the stegosaurus itself behind this link). This time, I have decided to make cards for a weekly calendar as well as […] Read more

Here is a quick little papercraft project for Halloween – a skeleton for the kids: This one is quite easy to make, however you may need to tweak it a bit in order to have it stand stably. Here is the PDF template: skeleton.pdf Want even more Halloween fun? Here is Frankenstein and his monster. […] Read more

Finally a new model, and  frankly one that I’m a bit proud of – after all, it did require quite some work to get it right in the end. And it’s my first one with movable parts. It’s a  lucky or beckoning cat,  popular in Japan and China (where I got the inspiration, when I […] Read more

I admit this is “somewhat” kitschy, but it can still make for a nice little gift for children, if you want to give them a set of pencils or felt-tip pens (kids love kitsch). It’s a peacock pen-holder: In case you wonder what the golden scribbles mean, and if they maybe are the next Voynich […] Read more

This is my take on the matryoshka theme: Six women from all walks of line, nested one inside the other: Of course, from a practical point of view, these dolls are somewhat lacking. As opposed to the ‘real’ matryoshka dolls made of wood, the paper version is very fragile and a bit finnicky to open […] Read more

A complete alphabet where each letter visually represents a word starting with that respective letter. The papercraft alphabet bridges the gap between the visual appearance of letters and their phonetic sounds. Read more

Nothing to see here, just a dinosaur doing science. His biggest weakness? Meteorites and volcanism. His biggest strength? The theory of evolution. He’s a strong believer in white labcoats and safety goggles. Here is the PDF template. Read more

Arrr… yes, mate, your eyes aren’t betraying you – this here is a pirate fish: And not the Somali kind either, but a true buccaneer, navigating the seven seas shipless. This one turned out nicer than I expected, therefore I almost feel inclined to make a whole crew – or should I say, school? – […] Read more

Ok, I’ll admit it: I’m officially an old man. I know Beatlemania is long over, and society has moved on, but what can I do – I’m still a Beatles fan. And as embarrasing as it may be, I especially like their classics. Such as Lucy in the Sky. And when you listen to that […] Read more

Here is something for the science buffs – or, more specifically, the genetic engineers among you: The X and the Y chromosome: Well, Y here lacks an arm and is quite small, but he makes up for it with his charms and not a small dosage of confidence. X, on the other hand, is all […] Read more

This is a valentine card with a special trick – when you rotate the image, it changes. I found this very cool idea and concept on the Extreme Cards and Papercrafting blog, and more specifically on this page – a very nice blog with a wealth of unusual, eye-catching and beautiful papercraft projects. Here is […] Read more

I decided to start a ‘line’ of very, very simple papercraft toys. I’m calling it Cubicity, as these have a, well, rather square shape, and the overall topic is slightly urban. Well, actually the cubicity people come from all walks of life, and if you look closely you will even discover that some are from […] Read more

This is a small cardboard toucan: It can sit on the corner of, say, your NEC monitor. In order to make that work, you have to glue a small weight such as a coin to the inside of the feet, like so: This will give enough balance to keep the bird safely atop of any […] Read more

Another year begins, meaning it’s time for a new calendar. It just so happens I made a weekly-calendar-enabled stegosaurus: Now the most interesting feature of a stegosaurus, on which Wikipedia has to say quite a bit, are the plates. Large scaly disks, of which neither the exact configuration nor the function seems to be entirely […] Read more

Now that I have featured the fox, the crow and the bear finger dolls, I wanted to show you all three together. All three being forest beasts, they go together quite well, the cheeky crow, the sly fox and the relaxed bear. These are extremely easy to make, and should be doable for kids at […] Read more

When it comes to finger dolls, it seems I have a slight bias for northern European forest beasts. Here is a crow: This one goes well with the fox and the bear. Here is the template as a PDF file. Read more

Following the finger doll bear, here is his good friend the fox: Again, very simple to build, definitely worthwile as a beginner’s project. And here is the PDF template. Read more

  As social creatures, we have the amazing ability to project a soul into virtually anything that has two eyes and a mouth. This opens up a world of possibilities when it comes to dolls. And sometimes the simplest dolls are the most loved ones. So I set out to create a couple of papercrafted […] Read more

It is a dear tradition in our family to get the kids an advent calendar. Now, for this year I wanted to make something myself rather than buy a run-off-the-mill calendar. And of course, being an advent calendar, it should be related to the story of Christmas. Voila, enter the DIY nativity scene advent calendar: […] Read more

  Who says mad scientists aren’t good for anything? Take this guy – while working on his master plan to take over the world, he is happily holding your business card: But that’s not enough, nooo – he can hold a whole stack of business cards on his back: This is him when he is […] Read more

  Here is one of the most pressing first world problems: Where to store your business cards. The solution: A very committed butler to hold them: He will patiently stay put on your desk and show your business card to visitors. Even better: On his back, he holds a whole stack of them cards. And […] Read more

Seems the piggy bank is slowly becoming a series, now that we have a wood version and the Manhattan map version. Be sure to collect them all. Here is the blue planet piggy bank: Here is the PDF template. Read more

Turns out the piggy bank template is quite versatile.Here is a Manhattan map edition: The map is from the OpenStreetMap project. Here is the PDF template. Read more

I’ve made a nice little template for a papercraft piggy bank. Exactly the right thing if you want to save up for a special occasion. Or to wrap up a monetary gift. It’s admittedly rather light, being made of paper and such. So to give it more weight, at least visually, I wrapped it in […] Read more

Meet Randy the office rat. He’s a pretty nice guy – if you know him better. In fact, Randy’s the coworker of your dreams. If you dream of coworkers like Randy, that is. And the best thing about Randy? It just so happens you can build him yourself. Here is the template in PDF format. Read more

This is fairly simple and doesn’t require glueing, although some precision cutting: A paper rocket made of interlocking parts: It’s not the most stable toy, and in fact is more something to look at than to play with. However, I like the kind of minimalistic charm of it. Here is how to assemble it: First, […] Read more

This little project is quite a contrast to the previously made P-Body– Not surprisingly, actually, as this was commissioned by a 4-year old girl. And girlish it is indeed: A nice little cottage. This can be used as a toy, or just for decoration. The original template is a little small for playing, so you […] Read more

Ok, so this is another somewhat nerdy papercraft, matching the Frankenturrets I did some time ago. It’s P-body, one of the two coop mode robots featured in Portal 2. This one was a bit tricky, as I had to compromise between the level of detail and complexity of the assembly. Therefore, it’s not entirely faithful […] Read more

Don’t ask me how it came to pass, but I decided to make a papercraft chameleon. After some tweaking of the color scheme, I settled for a classical B/W and red combination.   The daughter dismissed it as a toy, lacking the cuddly factor. So I had to reluctantly move it over to the decorative […] Read more

Hello, test subjects – Cave Johnson here. I give you – a paper model of the Portal 2 Frankenturret. It’s somewhat finnicky to assemble, I admit that, but it will be the best Frankenturret your desk has seen in a while, I assure you. You may want to build more than one, though, as they […] Read more

May I introduce you to the gentleman dinosaur: He is as distinguished as he is obsolete. That’s the way things go these days. If you want to assemble him, here is the template (see also instructions here): Corel Draw PDF PDF + GSD (Craft Robo) SVG Read more

Most of you will be too young to remember Herbie, the sentient Volkswagen Beetle created by Disney in more innocent times. Speaking of innocence, here is a slightly more dangerous version: I give you – the Herbieraptor. Read more

Aren’t you tired of the run-of-the-mill tame velociraptor? Well, here is a deadly variety – and it’s a lady. She has been wronged, and is now on a rampage to set things straight. How more deadly can it get? And she is armed, as well. With a Hattori Hanzo sword, no less: About time for […] Read more

They are called velociraptors for a reason – these guys are fast: And they are dressed to – no, not to kill, but to race. With their primary colors and fancy racing stripes, these guys are the envy of fashionistas all over the world. It’s not getting any more hipsteriffic. And here is the good […] Read more

Most of you will by now have seen the video of Nuclear Boy and his tummy problems. The media artist Kazuhiko Hachyia and the community have created a simultaneously hilarious and touching PA-style film which explains in a child-friendly way what’s going on at Fukushima. Imagine the confusion and fear experienced by children in the […] Read more

Sometimes the world of Lego® minifigures – as colorful as it may be – can be a bit mundane. Here is something to give it more style: High art. Hanging these up is significantly easier than with the real thing: Just align the holes in the flaps with the stubs of the wall bricks, and […] Read more

What would the world be without sheep? A sad, desolate place, that’s what. And to contribute to the sheepness of our nice little universe, here is a paper sheep: And lo and behold, you can make your very own, just by downloading, printing, cutting and gluing the template below. Admittedly this sheep is not as […] Read more

Here is company for the dog and the cow: A hippo. This is admittedly somewhat complicated to assemble. The head is curved, and getting the curvature right takes a little bit of patience. The rest of the model is very simple, but the head can give you, well, some headache. Here it is in a […] Read more

Playing with the fusion of Lego® and paper, I came across a nice way of improving the ubiquitous minifigures. A simple paper layout allows to quickly add new heads, featuring whatever design you come up with. Here is the result: The underlying design is quite simple and doesn’t require any glue. If you cut it […] Read more