Hexagon Artist Book Template

Lets take the humble (yet terribly versatile) snake book structure and adapt the page shape to a hexagon …

I’m participating in this year’s #areyoubookenough challenge and recently finished March’s hexagon themed book ‘Home’ with a variation of the snake book. I uploaded images of the work to my online gallery, (including the book’s poem) and shared it to social media. There I have been asked by a few people for a template of the hexagon book structure. So, here it is …

The Template

I played with a few variations of the overall template shape, with different numbers of hexagons and rows until I settled on the combination below. This template gives me 23 tiles, or pages. The tile (or page) order spirals around the outside and in to the final central tile at #23. The template can be adapted to include fewer or more hexagon tiles and rows, so have a go at making it your own!

Download a pdf version of the hexagon book template here.

If you have an A3 or large format printer, you can print this A4 pdf at a larger size. Or, use the template as a guide and draw your own hexagon grid, using my template example as a guide for placing then cutting and folding your hexagon book.

Overall, this is a simple book to make. Once you have the overall shape ready, cut into it to define the pages. Then follow the folding guidelines – folding each tile out then fold in on each alternate fold. It may seem a little confusing as you reach the folds around the corner tiles at #5, #9 and #13. With the nature of the alternating in/out folds, the book folds over itself at these corners.

My recommendation – make a mock-up of the book with plain paper BEFORE you trim you good art papers. This will help you get your head around the folding, and make sure you’re happy with the overall size of the book.

What is a hexagon?

In geometry world, a hexagon is defined as a polygon with six sides.

Eek … what’s a polygon? A polygon is any 2 dimensional shape formed with straight lines. Triangles, quadrilaterals, pentagons, and hexagons are all examples of polygons. Geometry lesson over 🙂

The Snake Book

The snake book is a wonderfully fun and dynamic structure to work with. It is also known as the ‘ox-plow’ and ‘boustrophedon’, with its creation attributed to Scott McCarney. The flexibility in how the book can be folded means that the book can be read in many different ways.

Making Handmade Books

Making artist books/handmade books is yet another love of mine! I have been making them since high school, often giving them as gifts.

Now I am enjoying making them for myself as a personal expression of me. I used to design the structures myself, coming up with all sorts of folds, sometimes stitching, sometimes gluing, and always with paper. I really do love paper!

Nearly 10 years ago I bought the book ‘Making Handmade Books: 100+ Binding Structures and Forms’ and my handmade book world opened up to a thousand new possibilities.

If you like to make your own books (or want to have a go) and don’t already have this book, I can’t recommend it highly enough. So many book forms, all illustrated with good step-by-step instructions. So many possibilities.

Author: Alisa Golden
To buy: Google it – so many options online
Cost: $30 +/-
Publisher: Lark
Published: 2011
ISBN: 9781600595875