The Japanese word origami literally translates into English as 'folding paper'. Origami is the art of folding paper into different figures like flowers, animals and other objects.
The crane figure is one of the most basic figures in origami. Because the figure is not overly complex, the crane makes a great way of familiarizing yourself with the different techniques used in origami.
Follow the instructions below to create your first origami crane.
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Start with a square piece of paper. You can use regular print paper or special origami paper if you can find it. |
| Fold the square diagonally by bringing the upper left corner to the lower right corner, so that you end up with a triangle. |  |
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Unfold the triangle and repeat step 2 but this time fold the lower right corner to the upper left corner. Unfold this second triangle as well. Two diagonal creases will now appear on the square. |
| Turn the sheet of paper over and fold it in half into a rectangle. Similar to the way you folded the two triangles earlier, repeat this step both ways, from bottom to top and from right to left. |
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Unfold the rectangles again and turn over the paper. You will see that your square piece of paper now has 4 fold lines: 2 diagonal ones (valley folds) and 2 straight ones (mountain folds). Using the fold lines you've created earlier, create a diamond shape. First, take the four corners A, B, C and D together |
| Then fold the paper together and flatten the figure into a diamond shape, keeping the center fold line in a vertical position. |  |
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Fold both the left corner (A) and right corner (B) of the diamond into the center fold line. |
| Turn over the diamond and repeat the previous step on the reverse side. Doing this will change the diamond shape into a longer shape that resembles a kite or ice cream cone. |  |
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Fold the top point of the upper triangle down to create a crease between the left and right corner of your kite shape. Now unfold the kite folds to recreate the diamond you had before. |
Pull up corner A and lift it backwards, all the way over upper corner D. The lower side flaps (B-A and C-A) will automatically fold in towards the center crease of the diamond. The upper side flaps are bit harder and will not naturally fold the way you want them to. The trick here is to reverse the creases you've made before to get the paper to lie flat in the long diamond shape as shown below. Turn over the figure and repeat this step on the other side. |
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Your paper will now have taken the figure of a stretched diamond shape, with 2 unattached triangles on the lower half of the figure, which look like legs. Both on the front and on the back of this figure, bring together the left corners (A and C) and right corners (B and D). This fold is called the book fold because the fold resembles turning the pages of a book. |
| The figure you have created now looks like a fox head with two pointy ears. Pull out each ear slightly in the direction of the arrows and press the paper down along the corners A and B to keep them in place. |  |
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Take the lower corner A and fold it over towards the top along fold line B-C that you created earlier. Turn the figure over and repeat this step on the other side. |
Take the end of one of the outer points -which will become the crane's neck- and bend it down. Reverse the crease in the head and pinch it in to create the crane's beak.
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Now take a step back and admire your work. Congratulations, you have just completed your first origami crane figure!
