The Origami Forum

I have made some 60 cranes for a gift, I am trying to figure out how to make something nice out of them, arragning them in a circle is my basic idea, but I don't know what to attach them to or how to attach them. Any suggestions?

I once gave away a bottle (an ordinary wine bottle out of clear glass) filled with a lot of small cranes (about 2 cm wingspan) in different colours, which looked really nice.
Of course that only works for small cranes and you would need more than 60 (or find a smaller bottle). It might also work with a jar but I don't think that would look so nice.

Thanks for the idea, but I already have the cranes. They are in two sizes, about 4" and about 6" (10 and 15 cm.) About half of each. Any other suggestions?

If you want to arrange the cranes (in what form ever) on a flat surface (preferably cardboard in a suitable colour) I would use photo tape (those small pieces of double-sided adhesive used to attach pictures in an album) which has the advantage that it usually can be removed easily without harming the paper.

I'm assuming that the gift is for someone's 60th birthday so arranging them as the numbers 6 and 0 might be nice.

This was what I had in mind, however, probably just in a circle, with a larger single crane in the middle.

why dont you try making the famous 100 cranes talisman which can be found in the fantastic book "Origami for the coinessuer"

Dragon_reborn42 wrote:why dont you try making the famous 100 cranes talisman which can be found in the fantastic book "Origami for the coinessuer"

As you can see, he wrote that the cranes are already finished, so making the senbazuru orikata isn´t an opportunity.
By the way, please try to write booknames correct (as well as creator names...), its easier to know what you are talking about and the search function will be able to find them when doing so. The book you are talking about is called "Origami for the Connoisseur" by Kunihiko Kasahara and Toshie Takahama.

About the cranes: What about sticking wood spits into the holes of the cranes and arranging them on a large cake or something like this?

Well I have a friend who folds cranes for gifts. What you could do is make some Chinese of Japanese symbol out of them. What my friend will do is fold the "good luck" character (except he does it with 1000 cranes, oh, he also does not have any wishes granted . anyway, that is basically my idea, make a symbol.

Another simple way is to string the cranes up and turn it into a mobile.

If you're going to mount it flat, another suggestion is to get a picture frame with a glass cover, then do a 2D arrangement of the cranes. You might need some glue or tape to stick it to the mounting board, but once everything is in place, it should hold up fairly well.

Well, what I ended up doing is getting a wooden ring about a foot across and hang the cranes from it in 4 garlands. Not the wreath I had planned on but quite nice nonetheless. Thanks for all your feedback everyone!

Just out of curiosity... how did you connect the cranes in garlands?

I pushed a needle up the bellybutton of the each crane and through the peak on its back, bottom crane first.