Hexagon box maker
Hexagon box template
A six-sided tray and a shallower lid that slips over it. Set the width across the flats and the height; the walls and tabs follow.
How to fold it
Print at 100% on cardstock. The base and the lid print side by side on one sheet.
Cut out both hexagons with their six walls, keeping the small grey tab beside each wall and its cut-back end.
Crease the six edges of each hexagon and the crease at the foot of every tab.
Fold the walls up one after another, turning each grey tab in behind the next wall and gluing it from inside.
Build the lid the same way: it is shallower and a little wider than the base.
Turn the lid over, line its corners up with the base's corners and let it slide down.
How the template is drawn
Across the flats
The width you type is inside, between two opposite walls. Corner to corner it is 1.155 times wider: 88 mm (3.46 in) across the corners at 3 × 2 in.
Six equal walls
Each wall is 44.1 mm (1.74 in) wide between its creases: the width across the flats plus a board, divided by 1.732 (the square root of 3).
Tabs for 120° corners
Neighbouring walls meet at 120°, so each tab folds only 60° to lie flat inside the next wall. On the sheet the gap between two walls is a 60° wedge, which is why every tab is cut back at its foot. Tabs are 12 mm (0.47 in) wide, at most 40% of a wall.
Lid play
The lid is wider across the flats than the base's outside by 0.8 mm (0.03 in) on each side, which leaves a little more room at the corners, so it turns into place easily.
Lid depth
17.8 mm (0.7 in) at the starting size: 35% of the height, between 10 and 40 mm, and never deeper than the box.
Room inside
The floor is 0.866 times the width across the flats squared, 87% of a square box as wide: about 255 ml at the starting size.
Gift boxes, sweets and honeycomb displays
A hexagon box holds round things neatly: a candle, a jar of honey, macarons, a stack of coasters. Several of the same size stand side by side like a honeycomb on a shelf or a party table. Choose “Tray only” for an open hexagonal dish. Printed in yellow with a bee sticker on the lid, a set of them makes a beehive centerpiece for a baby shower.
A square gift box with the same slip-on lid is the box with lid. For a gift that should stay shut on its own, try a tuck end box or a cube; for a pointed top, a pyramid, and for flat favors, a pillow box.
Measure across the flats, not the corners. The corners reach about 1.155 times farther than the width between two opposite walls, so a corner measurement would make the box about 15% too wide. Six boxes of the same size fit round a seventh, which suits a set of candles, soaps or tea tins arranged as a group. Fold the walls one at a time, so each new wall sits square to the base before its tab is glued.
