One of the few applications of the Miura-Ori (map fold) that I can tolerate folding is to make the fantail of Satoshi Kamiya’s Lyrebird.

I had a half-sheet of leaflitter paper in my stash (bought some 8 years ago) and thought it fitting to fold a bird that lives in the leaflitter out of it.

This is not my first fold of this beautiful model, but it is my best. Having good, thin, tough paper helps as accuracy is everything when folding the base – so many opportunities for crease misalignment exist and, as the paper thickness ramps up, there is bulk there.

Interestingly, the “bulk” ends up being in the body area which then naturally “fattens up” the bird in a really naturalistic way.

I decided he (assume it is a “he” because it is the males that display so OTT to impress their mate) needed a perch, so covered a lid with some of my Lemongrass, Daylily, Banana and cotton paper from a few years back.

Shaping and posing this beauty has taken a while – gently inserting a wire armature, posing angles with MC, closing seams so it is presentation stable.

This is model 1 in the “Project W” series – very happy with how it turned out.