"Creating Origami" - Project Update #2

Hey Everyone,

I just wanting to get a quick update out to everyone to keep you informed on what’s going on here at Lapin. First and foremost THANK YOU for all of the support and encouragement. We’ve gotten so many good ideas from everyone and are really appreciating the feedback. It feels so good that people are excited about the book and we are scrambling to make sure we give back to you as quickly and generously as you are giving to us.

There are a lot of updates we have, mostly from your questions and ideas, so this posting will be primarily to get you up to speed on all the developments with what we’re doing with the funding and what we have planned.

1) At your suggestion, the version of “Creating Origami” that will be provided to sponsors of this campaign will be a limited edition collector’s item. This version of the book will be labeled “first printing” and have a distinctive front cover and spine and should ship within a week of campaign completion. The standard, wide-release version will be available on amazon sometime in July or August. So be sure to let people know that this is a limited opportunity.

2) We’re currently in the process of having a beautiful model-menu made for the book using rotoscoping techniques which I wasn’t using at the time of “Creating Origami” but used extensively in my later diagrams. This of course is a serious rush order in such a short period of time as it requires us refolding EVERY model in the book, having them photographed and then rotoscopped and assembled into the book. But we’ve scheduled a “folding party” at Lapin Studios this weekend and the photo-shoot the following so we’re on schedule. We’ll release those pages as soon as they are available.

3) We’re working on finalizing the set of documents for the “Lost Diagrams” PDF and hope to get back to you soon on the final list. We’re hoping they will include a new set that I’m working on for a beautiful and complex modular model by Francesco Mancini which I’ve been working on.

4) We’ve updated “Grandma’s Package” to clarify our intent for that level and added a new version that is even cooler. Check the FAQ for details…

5) By the way, I have ONE more copy of the original printing that I’d like to make available… however it is already inscribed. Please send me a message if you are interested or know someone who might be.

The last piece of big news is what we’re planning on doing with the extra funds...

I’ve always loved the work of Patricia Crawford and when I arranged with her back in ’95 to include her models in “Creating Origami” I discussed with her the possibility of creating a retrospective of all her work in a single volume.

She has an interesting legacy because back in the 60s when she was doing her designs there was really nothing like what she was bringing to the art. In a field where most designers were magicians (that’s what caused the spread of popularity in origami in the 40’s/50’s) and nearly all male, she brought a beautiful sense of lyricism and elegance to her work.

Unfortunately, because she was primarily a hobbyist, her work was spread out across many volumes, a model here, another there, and most of those books are now out of print and hard if not impossible to find.

So, back in ’95 I had a dream of creating a retrospective of her work, putting all of her models into one place so they could be preserved for future generations and at the time she agreed and all the permissions and rights were properly established. Unfortunately, my schedule and subsequent health-issues forced me to scale back my work load, so the book was never completed.

But now I have greater bandwidth to take on the project and with the extra funding I am committed to completing the job. All I need is to figure out the proper budget and scale - which I’m currently working on in the background.

So more details will follow… but in the meantime keep posting your friends about the campaign, tweets, facebook, etc… and I’d love your feedback and ideas around a Crawford Retrospective.

With Deep Gratitude,

JC Nolan