Flipping through Makoto Yamaguchi’s “Origami Dragons Premium”, as one does, I stumbled across a lovely Wyvern, designed by Chuya Miyamoto:

Digging through my paper stash I found the perfect sheet for this model, a purple spotty Do paper that was part of a prize I won from Phạm Hoàng Tuấn’s Vietnamese origami paper shop pre-pandemic, so decided to give it a whirl.

My philosophy when approaching a super-complex origami design is based around “fuck around and find out” or more politely “fold until I finish or it fails”, and this model was a real treat.

A truly great design and fold sequence takes into account the material, not overly stressing it, managing accumulating layers and locking things together to keep things tidy. This design was so satisfying to fold, and in combination with the paper choice the resultant model is stunning.

All too often folded paper wants to unfold – this sheet was really different (and made me decide to order more of this amazing paper). All the shaping and finishing was done DRY – no glue, no MC, folds only – so cool. Over 250 steps, many initially baffling, it was lovely to leisurely fold this over the past couple of days – a real joy.

The key difference between a Dragon and a Wyvern is the LEG count – apparently dragons have 4, wyverns have 2. Additionally both may have claspers at the first joint of their wings also. This model even has thought out the musculature and other morphology making a really believable finished beastie.