Octagon box maker
Octagon box template with lid
Eight walls round an octagon and a slip-on lid with the same eight sides. Type the width across the flats and the height, or print the tray alone.
How to fold it
Print at 100%. Base and lid sit side by side on one sheet; cardstock keeps the eight corners crisp.
Cut out both octagons with their walls and the narrow grey tab on the edge of each wall.
Crease the eight edges of each octagon and every tab crease.
Fold the walls up. Each grey tab turns in at a shallow angle and is glued behind the next wall, all the way round.
Build the lid the same way; it is drawn a little bigger across the flats so it slips over the base.
Put the gift in and lower the lid on, turning it until its sides line up with the base.
How the template is drawn
Across the flats
The size you type is inside, between two opposite flat walls. Each of the eight walls is that size × tan 22.5° wide: 36.9 mm (1.45 in) at 3.5 × 2 in.
Tabs at 45°
Neighbouring walls meet at 135°, so each 12 mm (0.47 in) tab folds only 45° to lie flat behind the next wall, and is cut back at its base where the gap between two walls on the sheet is just 45° wide.
Lid play
The lid's inside is the base's outside plus 0.8 mm (0.03 in) between every pair of flats (0 to 3 mm under Settings), so it lifts off without sticking.
Lid depth
35% of the height, kept between 10 and 40 mm and never deeper than the box: 17.8 mm (0.7 in) here, with walls 37.8 mm (1.49 in) wide.
Rounder than a hexagon
With eight sides the box is closer to a circle: its corners stick out only 8% past the flats, against 15% on a hexagon, so a round jar or cake sits snugly.
Cake, candles and round gifts
An octagon box holds a round cake slice, a candle in a jar, a jar of honey or a stack of macarons with little wasted room. Choose "Tray only" for an open display tray, or a tall shape for a candle. Its eight flat walls take a strip of washi tape or a printed band all the way round without wrinkling, which a round tin never does.
The six-sided hexagon box is the honeycomb look; the four-sided box with lid packs flat into a drawer. For a pointed gift, see the hexagonal pyramid box, and for a carry handle the gable box.
The distance across the corners is about 1.082 times the distance across the flats, so the eight walls come close to a circle without the cost of a round tube. That makes it a sensible shape for a round cake, a pair of candles in jars or a ring of cookies, with only a thin gap at each side. Measure the flats with a ruler across the opening, not the corners, and the lid's play is set from that same number.
