Boxes and Booze 9/11/21 Boxes and Booze 9/11/21

Dabbit Invasion!

This story arguably starts back in 1892, in a German satire magazine called Fliegende Blätter (flying leaves / loose sheets), where the first published illustration of these ambiguous animals appeared with the caption “Rabbit and Duck”. Was it a rabbit, or a duck?

Boxes and Booze 9/4/21 Boxes and Booze 9/4/21

HexTrios

Third times a charm may or may not apply to this set of puzzle boxes, the HexTrios by Eric Fuller and Matt Dawson. That depends on whether you find devilishly puzzling mechanisms to be charming or not.

Boxes and Booze 8/28/21 Boxes and Booze 8/28/21

Lift Box

Next on the menu is a little light fare to lift your spirits and set the mood. It’s one of my favorite Fuller boxes because it’s just so darned clever and incredibly well executed.

Boxes and Booze 8/21/21 Boxes and Booze 8/21/21

Mame Box

Welcome to the epicurean experience of the season, a limited interlude featuring a truly passionate champion of the art form. I’m going to be serving a five course meal that will leave you a little Fuller each week.

Boxes and Booze 8/14/21 Boxes and Booze 8/14/21

Blackout

“Like a running blaze on a plain, like a flash of lightning in the clouds. We live in the flicker -- may it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling! But darkness was here yesterday.”

― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

Boxes and Booze 8/7/21 Boxes and Booze 8/7/21

Book Puzzle Boxes

It’s time to reach for a good book. We love books at Boxes and Booze headquarters, and puzzle boxes compete for space on the bookshelves with them here. Monday Aug 9 (2021) is National Book Lover’s Day, which is cause for celebration, and calls for an apropos special offering.

Boxes and Booze 7/31/21 Boxes and Booze 7/31/21

Donay Apple

Last summer I spent a puzzling “sabbatical” teaching classes at the University of Berkeley. The course didn’t take place in sunny California, however; rather, it was located in the English Midlands county of Leicestershire, where master turner John Berkeley resides.

Boxes and Booze 7/24/21 Boxes and Booze 7/24/21

Perpetual Hinge

The first law of thermodynamics states that energy can not be created or destroyed, only transformed from one form to another. The second law relates to entropy, stating that any system will move toward a state of disorder. These two laws should suggest that the mythical “perpetual motion machine”, a device that works via its own contained mechanics, forever, is an impossibility.

Boxes and Booze 7/17/21 Boxes and Booze 7/17/21

Tornado

Master craftsman Akio Kamei, the founder of the Karakuri Creation Group of Japanese artisans, is famous for his ability to create pieces that tell a story. His work is prized for its novelty, beauty and ingenuity. It’s no wonder that he has been a source of inspiration and admiration for American artist Kagen Sound, whose own work is highly prized for similar reasons.

Boxes and Booze 7/10/21 Boxes and Booze 7/10/21

Hydrant

The Hydrant was Austrian puzzle designer Stephan Baumegger’s sensational entry in the 2018 International Puzzle Design Competition, where it garnered him a top ten vote award.

A spirited journey through the world of collectible artisan puzzles