Heart box maker
Heart box template with lid
A heart-shaped base, a wall that bends round it and a lid with its own shallow wall. Type the heart's width and the height; the strips are cut to the heart's exact outline.
How to fold it
Print at 100% on cardstock no heavier than 250 gsm, so the walls bend round the lobes without cracking.
Cut the two hearts and the two strips, with the small teeth along one edge of each strip.
Crease the line along the teeth and the single crease where the wall turns in at the top of the heart; the rest of each strip is not creased, it bends. Pre-curl the strips round a pen.
Glue the long strip's grey tab inside its other end to make a heart-shaped ring with its point at the seam, and fold all its teeth in.
Glue the smaller heart under the teeth, matching its point to the seam, and press the wall into shape from inside.
Make the lid the same way with the short strip, gluing the bigger heart on top of its teeth, then lower it onto the box.
How the template is drawn
The heart's shape
A square turned 45° with a circle on each of its two upper sides, the circles' radius half the square's side: 29.8 mm (1.17 in) for a heart 4 × 2 in. The width is 3.414 times that radius.
Strips cut to the outline
The wall strip is exactly as long as the heart it wraps, measured half a board out from the inside: 12.08 in (306.8 mm) here, plus a 12 mm (0.47 in) glue tab. Round the lobes it is the length of the arcs, not of straight chords.
Lid play
The lid's strip wraps a heart 0.8 mm (0.03 in) bigger all round than the box's outside (0 to 3 mm under Settings), so it is 12.33 in (313.1 mm) long and the lid slips on.
Teeth
7 mm (0.28 in) teeth, narrowed at their ends where the outline curves so they lie flat side by side when turned in; the hearts are glued over them, so the teeth stay hidden from outside.
Lid depth
35% of the height, kept between 10 and 30 mm and never deeper than the box: 17.8 mm (0.7 in) here.
Valentines, weddings and keepsakes
A heart box holds chocolates, a ring, a love note or wedding favors. Print the lid in red or pink and leave the walls plain, or put a name on the lid. A deep heart box holds a candle; a shallow one, a few truffles in paper cups.
For a gift that opens like petals, try the hexagonal pyramid box with a ribbon; for a round-ish box with a lid, the octagon box; for a gift card, the pillow box; and for a single sweet carried upright, the cupcake box.
