San Francisco Center for the Book

Spend a day creating your own fun and versatile box that can be used as a shadow display box or a traditional puzzle box with beads.

Students will build a small 4-5" square box, then choose paper imagery to create a tiny, layered diorama inside, protected with a Plexiglas cover. It's an interesting and useful structure on its own, but with the addition of some tiny balls it can also become a puzzle box!

Students will have the option to leave their boxes as-is, or add circular divots so that balls can be rolled about by manipulating the box, with the goal of getting each ball to settle in a divot. It's harder than it looks.

(Known as a “dexterity puzzle” or “ball-in-the-hole” puzzle, this is a classic children's toy and most folks over 40 will have handled or seen one at some point, though they're a bit more rare these days. If you're still not quite sure what we're talking about, do a google search for “vintage dexterity puzzle".)

In addition to being a fun project, this workshop is also an excellent introduction to simple box making, and good practice for some of our other workshops including the Box Making Core classes.

Prerequisite:
None

Materials to bring:

• Small objects to be used in your box, collage items, beads, pearls, coloring pens, pictures. Material for making these lively little boxes can be found everywhere: junk drawers, garage sales, second-hand shops, used bookstores, in the woods, at the seashore, the dollar store.
• Students are also welcome to bring any of their own favorite bookbinding tools or art supplies.

About the Instructor:
Bettina Pauly (she/her) lives in San Francisco and works as both a book artist and a letterpress printer with Kim Vanderheiden at Painted Tongue Studios, Oakland, California. She loves books and boxes both as physical objects and as containers of meaning. She is interested in a variety of folded, sewn and woven structures in which she can incorporate her printing.