DIY Origami Lampshade!

First post, eh? I was going to do a whole introduction-ey thing but I can't be arsed so here's a tutorial on how to make a lampshade!!! YAAAAYYY!

I saw these lampshades on etsy and have coveted them ever since, but, alas, I am poor :(.
I began trawling the web for an origami tutorial that would teach me to make something similar. A few came close and were really pretty and interesting, but none were quite what I wanted. That is until I came across this on my Pinterest feed.
"Hallelujah!" I thought, but then i read the comments that begged the ingenious creator, Nadieh Bremer, to make a tutorial. Although, to be fair, she does pretty much say exactly how she made it, for those as lazy as myself I have created this tutorial.
The lampshade is based on the origami magic ball, an excellent tutorial for which can be found here. I am probably going to refer back to the individual parts of that video to explain some of the folding so....yes! ONWARDS!

I made my giant (here meaning "actual lampshade size") lampshade using lining paper...for walls. Did I mention I'm poor?
It's a little flimsy and incredibly bland but at about £3 for a roll of 10m from Homebase it was worth it to at least create a place holder until I can be bothered to make a better version. Here I will be showing you how to do the folds on a model made from A4 sized paper, but I will put in the measurements for the large one as well as some maths stuff for scaling and what-not as I go...ONNNNWWAARRDSS!

The paper ratio for the origami magic ball is 2:1 for this lamp it is 8:3 because according to some people 2:3/4 is not an actual ratio (pfft). In order for this to work the squares need to be the shape they would be in the magic ball but you are working on one less row....That probably makes no sense.
Normally, with the magic ball you would have four times as many columns as rows (in this video there are 32 columns and 8 rows), for this lampshade you need fewer squares so you would be working with 16 columns and 4 rows BUT in order to achieve the look of these Moth lampshades you only need 3 rows....Essentially you just lop off a row while maintaining the original measurements...Goodness that's hard to explain. TO THE MATHMOBILE!!

To make the miniature version take a piece of A4 printer paper measure the long sides and mark a point 29cm from one side. This is easier than working with the odd dimensions of A4 paper. Then measure the short side and mark a few points at 10.9cm. Then chop off the excess. In basic terms make the paper 29cm by 10.9cm.
 For my large model I used paper that was 56cm by 149cm. 
Actually it was 56 by 151cm. This extra 2cms gave me an easier way to join the lamp together in the end and i highly recommend it if you can do it. Just add an additional 2cms to your paper on the long edge and fold it behind the face of the paper you will be working on so it's out  the way. Keep the whole 2cm shabang on one side of the paper otherwise you will have a weird extra bit that no one wants. So ANYWAY it's as if I made a model that used paper in the 2:1 ratio (so 149 x 74.5cm) but then chopped of a quarter of the short side.

If you already have a piece of paper in the right ratio then skip the mathy-math - if you have a piece of paper that is 2:1 lay it out landscape and fold it in to quarters horizontally then chop off the bottom quarter. Shimples. 

MATHY MATHY MATH MATH:
if you have paper with a fixed length short side like i did (56cm) pop the length of your short side into the following equation to get the length of the long side where 'n' is the length of your short side:
((n/3)*4)*2= length of long side.

I realise that probably makes no sense to the mathematically challenged like myself so divide the length of your short side by 3, times that result by 4, then times that result by 2 and you should have the length your long side should be. Though if you copy and paste that equation in to google with the proper lengths in lieu of 'n' it will tell you the answer.

If you have a fixed length long side then ('n' here is the length of the long side): ((n/2)/4)*3= length of short side.
Or - half the length of the long side, divide that result by 4 and times that result by 3, et voila!

You should definitely, DEFINITELY spray your paper with flame-retardant spray by the way!
This is very important to prevent...you know, fires and such. The paper will usually need to be pretty saturated so it may be best to spray it before hand, let it dry and then commence with the folding. However, it can also be done at the end. I bought a basic fire retardant spray off Amazon for about £15 (I can't actually find it any more though...hmmm) but apparently you can make your own fire retardant liquid with Borax.


ONNNNNNNNWWWWAAAAAARRRDDDSSSSS!

Lay your paper out landscape and fold it in half vertically. 

If you already have the paper folded into thirds horizontally then you get to miss out a later step, nice! This step is still fundamental though...

Lay the paper back out flat and fold it in to quarters. It's explained pretty well how to fold into quarters, eighths and so on in this video if you are having trouble (that's the third time now...)

As you might have guessed you now need to fold your paper into eights, dividing the quarter sections in half....  

....and now sixteenths.

Now that you've done that, (if you already have the paper folded into thirds,this is the step you miss) you need to fold the paper into thirds horizontally. I did this by dividing the length of the short side by 3 - on the miniature this was 3.6cm, on the large scale version it was 18.7cm (i rounded up)- and marking this point from one of the long sides. I then folded the paper over so that the edge of the long side met this mark and the opposite edge met the fold.

Pick a corner,any corner! Now fold that corner! fold the corner so that it meets the first vertical fold it sees as explained here at about 2:30 in. 
Now keep introducing that corner to new vertical folds! Again, see the video if you are confuddled. I am terrible at explaining things. Your corner will meet the long side of the paper, that's ok! KEEP GOING!!!! :D

Eventually you will have no more folds that the corner can meet and you will have come to the edge of the paper. You papery-do will look somewhat like this: 

Hopefully.

I mean I can't see your but I assume it's worked. Well done.

Now take the opposite corner to the one you started with (opposite diagonally) and have that meet fold after fold until you've got diagonal folds all across your paper when it's laid out flat. 

Speaking of which, lay it out flat. It should look something like thiiiiiiisssss:

It's important to have all of your folds in the same direction, i.e valley folds. Well apparently...It's been said but I never really saw any evidence for it since you are constantly flip-flopping the folds later on but meh. I am no an experienced origamist (Origamier? Origamatron?).

Now take one of the corners that hasn't met any folds yet, the poor lonely soul, and basically do the same thing in the opposite direction. 

You should have this awesome quilted pattern all over your paper.

But we're not done yet, ohhhhhh noooo.

That's pretty obvious.

Imagine if I just left it there....






For the next step you need to go back to all those vertical folds and concertina them up, alternating
valley and mountain folds like you're making one of those paper fan things that I'm pretty sure everyone has made as a child.

Then do it in the opposite direction (so the paper is folded in both directions) - if you have thicker paper this is slightly more important as it makes it easier to fold the tricky parts later and you may want to do the same thing with the diagonal lines as well. Be warned though, if you fold it to much the paper will become weak, flimsy and occasionally get holes or tears in it, also if you accidentally miss your mark and make a fold too close to another fold or two folds where there should only be one, it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to fold the tricky parts. I learnt this from experience and there was much swearing and annoyance all round.

Lay it out flat again- ish, if you're me. Take the horizontal folds and fold them all back on themselves (in the opposite direction) so you have sumat like thissss:

Aaannnddd then lay it out flat. BOOM.


Now you're going to be working with all them squares you've created. THIS VIDEOOOO is awesome and is really clear on how to make the folds you are going to be doing for the top and middle rows.

Here, you want to skip a column on the top row. Just ignore it, call it a bum, whatever, just move on to the next squarey-do.



You want this bit folded....poo, how should i explain this? You need to make sure the diagonal lines in this segment are valley and the vertical one is a mountain (though all of the outer sides of your segment/square should be mountains to make this easier...ohhhh this isn't going very well....)


and you sort of....need to smush the bottom and top of the square together so you get...something like this:

 Again, the video makes this all way clearer than I could.

The column that you called a bum earlier should be faffing about now, if this all worked out well for you.

It really won't know what to do with itself.
You need to fold the bottom bit so it lays square and flat:

and just fold the top triangle over:
Huzzah!!

Continue to do the folds that i so terribly explained earlier all the way across the top row and you'll be left with a column to fold as you did the bum-column. The last column is also a bum.

On to the second row! Instead of leaving a bum-column here you want to go ahead and do that foldey-whotsit right in the first square and all along the row (the video!! THE VIDEOOO!!!).




If you have by some miracle managed to understand that explanation you should have something like this.

BRILLIANT.

If you don't have something like this, I don't blame you, I blame me. I will update with better explanations!



Now the bottom row really confused me. Here Nadieh Bremer explains that she folded the bottom section in the opposite direction, I thought this meant the bottom row, which it doesn't. Then I thought she meant the bottom half of the bottom section (which she does) but I didn't realised that the reverse folding needs to be moved one column to the left (which it does). This resulted in me trying to do some folding which is impossible. It sucked to have come so close to the final product and then to have ruined it. It really sucked. Any-who, here's how you do do it:


Leave a bum column and go on to the next square (as in the first row).

In the top half of the square, fold as you have with the previous two rows.
the vertical column in the middle should be a mountain fold,as well as the outside edges of the square,while the diagonals should be valleys. Just leave the bottom half as a valley for now so it all collapses down nicely.
 << Like this.



Continue until the end of the row like this.

Now go back to the start.

This time make friends with the bum column.
the bum-column is now part of a square (as it was in the second row), fold the bottom half of this square in reverse to how you normally would.

The diagonal folds are now mountains and the vertical fold should be a valley.

I found that the best way to do this was to hold the whole thing in both hands and puss backwards on the vertical fold with my thumb and foward on the digonal folds from behind. This flopped it sufficiently. I don't think i have ever used that sentence before in my life.

Continue in this fashion until you have reached the end of the row.

You have now completed all of the folding necessary to make this doobly-do!!!
 SMASHING!!!




All you need to do now is join it at the top using thread. I will probably give a better explanation on how to do this at some point but for now, make holes through the top pointy bits, thread something durable like yarn or bakers twine through all the holes. Do this loosely at first because, if you are putting this over a lightbulb, you will first need to get the lightbulb

through this hole.
If you have not already sprayed your lampshade with flame-proofing this would be a good time. If you are using this as a lampshade this is very very very important. If you have exceptionally hot lightbulbs this lampshade is probably not a good idea at all, but,while the flame-retardant will not actually stop the paper from burning it will stop it from flaming and thus burning all your stuff. Which would be bad. Very bad.

Join that 2cm space (remember that?) to the opposite edge, I used a needle and thread because it looked nicer than tape and was less likely to melt than glue.

Magic!!!

Now pop it over your bulb or fixture, try to make sure that the paper doesn't actually come in to contact with your bulb because no amount of flame-proofing will prevent fires otherwise...Again this is almost certainly very bad. Unless you hate your house, in which case I am pretty sure there are easier ways to burn it down. Tighten all that thread at the top so it won't fall off your fixture and you are done!!

I will eventually post an update where I post more pictures of how to actually fit your lampshade, however, at this moment in time I have two sofas in my tiny living room, one in front of the other, and can't reach the light to actually put mine up...I'll get there...

I hope this was helpful and I hope you enjoy!!
Toodle-pip
Cheery-Bye!!
What-what!!