Paper Template for Plywood Sculpture

Ray and Charles made elaborate brown paper templates with notations to guide the fabrication of this large-scale molded plywood sculpture. In this photograph, one can see how they layered brown paper to indicate thicker or thinner plies (plywood veneer sheets), depending upon the needs. Most plywood furniture has a consistent number of plies, but the secret of the Eameses’ success with this molded plywood sculpture was the use of varied ply layers in critical spots to facilitate stability. This isn’t apparent to the eye as all the layers are concealed under a consistent top surface of veneer ply.