The Art of Origami

This is an excellent origami book by an author who specialises in producing origami books which are beautifully photographed and diagrammed by using a series of photographs of step folds. This particular example is in softback but the book has been produced on quality paper with heavy card for the covers. The book kicks off with a sumptuous gallery containing illustrations of some more modern pieces from the 1990s. Mr Beech then provides some of the best instructions I have seen for creating your own duo papers, and provides some instructions also on how to work some of the sequences of folds which appear in the models. Although the book starts with a series of relatively simple models it very quickly progresses to models which would be classed in a convention as high intermediate, including pieces such as Enomoto's Elephant and Adolpho Cerceda's wonderful Peacock. I would therefore regard it as suitable for someone who has done origami before and would like to progress into slightly more advanced work. Rick Beech is an excellent teacher and his selection of models will keep most people happy for some time.

This is an excellent book for anyone at an intermediate level, and maybe even talented beginners. The diagrams are given as photos, and they are all quite clear and easy to follow, excepting perhaps Beech's predilection for using patterned papers, which can become a little confusing. But he's one of the better authors out there. Incidentally, don't bother buying more than one of his books: they mostly contain the same projects in different orders.