Three-Dimensional Paper Engineering

Three-dimensional paper engineering is simply a fancy way of saying pop-up books! The University of New Hampshire has received a donation of almost 2,000 pop-up books and they are now on display at the UNH Museum. What a great way to spend an afternoon, but you'd better make plans now, the exhibition is only open through December 16.

We don't generally purchase pop-up books in our children's room collection due to the fragility of the medium, but, we do have a fine example of an adult pop-up book which we keep in our reference collection for people to oooh and aaah over: Fenway Park: Legendary Home of the Boston Red Sox by John Boswell and David Fisher [R 796.357 BOS].

We do have several books for kids on paper engineering, such as The Usborne Book of Paper Engineering by Fiona Watt [J 736.982 WAT]. Just in time for the holidays is How to Make Holiday Pop-Ups by Joan Irvine [J 745.594 IRV].

Before they were commonly known as pop-up books, paper engineered books were referred to as movable books. There's an organization known as the Movable Book Society, which has on its website, a great collection of links for anyone who is interested in paper engineered books.