Labyrinth Box

I’ve had the idea of using a labyrinth marble game to unlock a box bouncing around my head for about 5 months now. When Baileigh Industrial announced their contest over on sawmill creek, I figured that was as good an excuse as any to start it (and more importantly, ensure I finished it fairly quickly).

My first attempt, I wanted just the weight of the ball dropping into a goal hole to unlatch things, but there simply wasn’t enough mass there to trip any latch I could build for it. This one is simplified a fair bit from that original idea, instead using a push button on the outside, that “connects” with the rest of the latch using the marble as a bridge between the pieces – no marble, the parts cant reach each other so the button does nothing.

The text on the logo in the center as well as the walnut part of the hinges were cut out on a CNC router I finished building a couple months ago, the rest is pretty standard box construction – dados and mitered corners. Its made of walnut, with maple for the floor of the labyrinth, some very curly okume plywood for the inside of the lid, and an unknown veneer that I then pinstriped with maple and walnut for the banding. The inside is just floored with some grey suede – hadn’t thought of it at the time, but using the same cloth for the backdrop makes it appear it has no bottom when photographed :).

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