I stumbled across the instructions for a glorious checkerboard kusudama designed by Andrey Ermakov, an insanely talented designer from Russia:
![Russian Lilac unit designed by Andrey Ermakov](https://i0.wp.com/www.wonko.info/365origami/wp-content/uploads/lilac1.jpg?resize=764%2C547)
I decided to try and make ONE module – an exhausting process that starts with a HEXAGON initially divided into a 16 grid, then you dance through moves that flash and hide the reverse colour of the paper until you get this lovely pattern. This took me in excess of 2 hours!!! For ONE unit!!!!! You then crenelate and interweave them to make a spikey ball, tucking in tips to complete the tessellated surfaces.
![Russian Lilac shaped to allow others to interlock.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wonko.info/365origami/wp-content/uploads/lilac1_3d.jpg?resize=764%2C652)
Had I no life, and a LOT of paper, I would consider making all 30(!?!?!?!) of these things necessary to make the most complex spikey ball there is – a beauty that is not within my reach (for now) due to time pressures.
It is a timely reminder that astonishing and beautiful things come from Russia; ugly political and military action does not diminish this fact.