[fkvesic]

My husband bought this small Japanese 7-step marquetry puzzle box as part of my birthday present - along with a suggestion that I should carve a netsuke to fit into it. As the internal dimensions of the box are 1 1/4" x 1 1/4" x 1 3/8" it'll certainly be a test:

[Janel]

It certainly sounds like a challenge! Remembering the steps for opening this charming box will also be a challenge. Do you have any thoughts about what you might carve?

Happy Birthday Freda, by the way!

Janel

[fkvesic]

Many thanks, Janel. I've got as far as sawing a piece of boxwood to the right dimensions to make sure it fits, but haven't dreamed up a design as yet. I'll just probably contemplate the sawn piece and see what slowly congeals in my imagination before doing some drawings. I do have plenty of ideas/drawings/photos in a file, but none that would be suitable for this particular shape.

Update 12/09/09: I've decided on a design, Janel. I'm doing some drawings of a mouse clutching pumkin seeds, crouched on a box. I wanted to keep the box theme and I've been studying a friend's son's white mice. He thinks I'm mad and should get some real ones! Oh well!

[Ed Twilbeck]

fkvesic Several years ago I was a box maker. I made some Boxes, that was inside of a box inside a box, and then the last was a cube that was the same design as the first out side box. the cube was the only thing that moved when you shook the box, so they whould open to find the treasure inside. One I made looked something like your Puzzle box.

[fkvesic]

Ah, thank you, Ed. I've got some of the ones you describe, made by a Scottish turner, and with the outside box no bigger than the ones Janel is now turning. One's a five-box item, and the other's a three-box one. Friends know my penchant for miniature things. No marquetry on those, though.

[Woodworm]

Happy birthday.

How about a "puzzle" Netsuke for inside? A puzzle inside a puzzle.

Bill