Furniture from paper patterns

In 1947 Australian Home Beautiful launched the Patterncraft do-it-yourself furniture-making scheme.

Designs by Fred Ward were intended to allow Australians on low incomes and especially returning servicemen to construct their own low-cost but well-designed furniture. Making your own furniture was the ideal solution to shortages of labour and building materials experienced immediately after World War II.

Makers of Patterncraft furniture were supplied with both working instructions and tissue paper patterns cut to the exact size of each component required for the job. The success of Patterncraft led to the participation of more furniture designers and the introduction of new schemes such as Blue-print and the Plycraft pattern service launched in May 1954. Another scheme under the name Timber Packs used the Patterncraft designs but provided customers with the actual timber components needed, which then only needed to be assembled at home.