“Moderation” — it isn’t in the ukulele player’s vocabulary, so why are you hesitating? You actually believe there are limits to the uke obsession? Puh-shah!! No way! Enjoy a stress-free Valentine’s Day: build your uke-crazed sweetie this heart-shaped ukulele box then fill it with See’s candies, jelly beans, an engagement ring, or Jake Shimabukuro tickets — whatever you do rest assured that ya done good.

Download “Ukulele Valentine Heart Box” template (532kB PDF)

Finished box with lid measures about 6” x 4” x 1.25”. Includes three sheets: box & lid plus truly garish interior pink-n-purple box “lining”.

I printed mine on 80 pound smooth paper and can attest that the resulting carton is a surprisingly sturdy beast — those interior strips really stiffen the structure.

Be forewarned! 45 minutes did I toil assembling this silly box, though I’m admittedly all thumbs when doing paper craft — glue covered thumbs, wrong bits stuck together; that level of ineptitude (rings oddly familiar, same can be said of my uke playing ). Heck, even basics — cutting along lines, folding straight edges — it’s all a challenge. Doodling artwork (Adobe Illustrator) on my new-ish MacBook Air while enjoying a brew at local coffee spots? That I can do.

"Uke Box" Prototype: overall scale and aesthetics check.

Some tips might be useful so here’s what I found helpful:

• Fold & glue the tuning pegs before doing your precise trimming.
• On the lid (the uke’s top) don’t worry about gluing all the way up to the edge, a bit of a lip is fine.
• Start attaching the sides with the headstock piece, beginning at the “V” where the head meets the fretboard.
• Once the fretboard sides are attached (don’t glue the very end bit as there might be some trimming required — I deliberately made the pieces longer than you should need) attach the body’s sides starting at the sharp point at the bottom of the heart shape — folding the sides in half and aligning the “V” to the point.
• Depending upon your paper stock you might need to “feather” the tabs a bit on the round corners of the head stock.
• Attach the lining sides first. The top & bottom lining pieces are larger than you need so dry fit, trim, dry fit, trim — until they fit snugly before gluing in place.

More dramatic lighting you say? Surely! Let me kick in the LED spots.

Oh, and for the record, I take extra pride in the slightly bowed frets and the tuning gears.

Ukulele (Valentine) Heart Box Paper Craft Template by Buz Carter is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at pizzabytheslice.com.

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012IllustrationHow-To, papercraft, ukulele, Valentine's Day