Mixed Tape

We were asked to choose two instruments, merge them and build a “new instrument” out of cardboard. While the merged instrument should be playable as a whole, it should also be possible to play the chosen instruments seperately. The model should be as 3D as possible and be understandable from every angle.

I decided to choose an accordion as my main instrument and thought I would thread a round rattle on the boxy end through a corner of the accordion. Not knowing where exactly to start, I made the small rattle first because I knew how I wanted to do it and that was also the easiest part. Then I put the accordion together in smaller steps. I started with the extendable middle part. I folded four rectangular parts over and over again to create the mobility of an accordion. The four individual parts were glued together at all folded corners and the gaps were filled with paper using a folding technique. Next, I put the bottom side of the instrument together and attached the buttons and the strap for the hand. I cut the rattle and threaded through two slits of the box. After the meeting we had after a week, together with the assistants, I decided to additionaly slide a wind instrument, which opens as a gramophone, through the cavity of the retractable middle part. The tube appears by squeezing the accordion. the next step was to build the keyboard. to make the keyboard moveable, i glued a spring under each key. To get a smooth curvature connecting the keyboard to the middle part, deformed the cardboard by wetting it. My final step was gluing the boxypart, the middlepart and the keyboard of the accordion together. The tube is just stuck to the right side of the accordion and free to slide through the hole on the left side. I attached a mouth piece to the end of the tube to add some detail and put two straps on the back of the instrument to make it more 3D and make it easier to hold.