Folded Froebel Squares — Vintage Geographia Map NE

£225.00

A striking piece of wall art made from forty individually folded Froebel origami squares, each cut from a single original 1930s Geographia canvas map of North East England. Geographia was a British cartographic publisher founded in the early twentieth century, renowned for its detailed road and regional maps printed on durable linen-backed canvas. This particular map dates from the 1930s — a period when motoring was transforming how people explored the country — and would have been folded into a pocket or glove box, consulted at roadsides, and handled with the kind of everyday familiarity that gives old maps their character. The canvas carries the warmth and patina of that age: faded colour washes, printed place names, and the quiet geography of a region before the motorway era reshaped it. Each of the forty squares has been individually folded using the Froebel method — a precise origami technique that creates a three-dimensional module from a flat sheet — then arranged so that every piece remains in its correct grid position relative to the original map. The result is a work that is simultaneously abstract and cartographic: you can read the landscape in the tones and markings, yet the surface has been transformed into something sculptural and tactile. The piece is presented in a handmade frame of obeche (African maple), hand-stained and waxed to a warm natural finish, and protected behind UV-resistant acrylic. It measures 53cm x 44cm and is ready to hang. A thoughtful gift for anyone with a connection to the North East, a love of maps and travel, or an appreciation for craft that turns something historical into something genuinely new. As a one-off piece made from an original map, it cannot be replicated — though we are happy to discuss a commission using a different map of your choosing.