Good morning and welcome back to the craft room! Today’s Flashback Friday post is going back to 2016 with an Explosion Box. This pattern makes a box that is 4″ square when completed. Let’s get right into it.
Explosion Box
A few years ago I saw instructions to make an explosion box, but when I tried to recreate it, something went terribly wrong. What appeared before my eyes was not even close to a square box shape, so I tucked the idea away. Not long ago, a friend mentioned seeing one of these boxes online and asked me if I had ever made one. After recounting the misadventure I decided to give it another go, and this time it turned out perfect!
To create this you will need:
3 pieces of 12” x 12” card stock for the box construction
1 piece of 8 ½” x 11” card stock for the lid.
Explosion Box Cut and Score Guide
For the 12″x12″ sheets of card stock, cut and score as follows:
#1 – leave at 12” x 12″ – score all four sides at 4”
#2 – cut down to 11” x 11” – score all four sides at 3 ¾”
#3 – cut down to 10” x 10″ – score all four sides at 3 ½”
For the 8 1/2″ x 11″ sheet cut and score as follows for the lid:
Cut this sheet of card stock to 6 5/8” x 6 5/8” – score all four sides at 1 ¼” and then set it aside for later.
Making The Box
Now let’s focus our attention on the box construction with the first three sheets of card stock. Using a pair of scissors or your favorite cutting device, remove the outside corner pieces at the score lines as shown in the following picture.
When you have finished with all three sheets, fold on your score lines. If you want to distress the edges, now is the time to do that. I used Vintage Photo Distress Ink by Tim Holtz and a foam applicator. Don’t forget to ink both the front and the back of each piece as well as the center score lines. This may also be a good time to add your decorative paper to each flap. I waited until my box was fully constructed and it was challenging. The next time I make an explosion box I will add the mats at this point.
To secure your layers together, use a strong tape adhesive, such as Redline or (my personal favorite) Scor-Tape. It was easier for me to start with the smaller panel and adhere it to the medium size panel before securing the group to the larger panel.
Cover Construction
Now to create the cover of our box let’s grab that last piece of card stock. Rather than completely removing the corner pieces as we did for the box base, we will just snip along the score line as shown in the following image. Also, now is the perfect time to add your decorative paper and to ink the edges if you so desire. Again, using a strong adhesive on the small flaps, create your box top.
From here you can add your photographs and even add a small gift to the center of the box. You now have a wonderful interactive gift for your loved one to open and enjoy.
Mat Layer Size Guide
Here is the cutting guide for the mats for each layer of the box.
Inside center square of the box: 2 ¾” x 2 ¾”
Lid top and inside square: 3 7/8” x 3 7/8”
Lid side panels x4: 1 1/8” x 3 7/8”
If you cover the front and back of each panel, you will need 8 pieces of each size below.
Small box panels: 2 ¾” x 3 ¼”
Medium box panels: 3 ½” x 3 ¼”
Large box panels: 3 ¾” x 3 ¾”
The Finished Explosion Box
Because this was just an experiment, I didn’t do much decorating. I did have a few leftover sunflowers from Heartfelt Creation Classic Sunflower Collection. I added some yellow Memento ink to the petals and glued them into place.
Rather than add a million pictures of the finished box, I played around in Movie Maker and created a slide show/video to showcase the finished project. Well, little did I know that you can’t just upload a video file, so I also ended up creating my own YouTube channel in the process. Let me know what you think!
Thank you so much for joining me on my this Flashback Friday adventure. It was fun creating this Explosion Box. Have you ever made one? If so I’d love to see it!! Drop me a link in the comments below. Have a wonderful weekend and I’ll see you again next Friday for another Flashback!!
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