Need a quick fix to hide any unsightly-looking items around the house this coming Chinese New Year? Or want something beautiful to display items in your home? Then make yourself your very own ang bao basket and fill them with yummy delicious fruits, snacks or even flowers! You can even gift them as part of your wrapper for a CNY hamper.
This basket is made from six ang baos in a hexagonal shape, plus six ang baos for the pop-out effect and four ang baos for the basket handle. You might wonder, why do Chinese always use groups of six or eight during Chinese New Year? The number six symbolises luck and the number eight symbolises fortune. Hence it is often six or eight for many things. For example, in many assorted preserved fruits sold in supermarkets which are sometimes called Trays of Togetherness, they come in an octagonal box of eight different types of fruits or candy. They symbolise good fortune and joy for the whole year.
I could make an eight-sided (octagonal) ang bao basket, but I didn’t have enough ang baos for this craft. To be honest, I am struggling to get hold of ang baos/red packets/red envelopes at this point – a lot of places are sold out for the new year.
In my previous post, I mentioned that ang pow and ang bao are the same words. It is just used in different dialect pronunciations. As I have used a lot of ang pows in my blog post titles, the naming of the images is getting more and more difficult and I’m using super long URLs (can’t have the same name for different images). Hence I am using ang bao wording from now onward.
The rating of difficulty is 3 out of 5, which should take roughly 45 minutes to complete. The basket without the pop-out ang baos and handle measures approximately 15 cm by 15 cm. The basket with the pop-out ang baos and handle measures approximately 22 cm by 22 cm by 34 cm. This basket is great for display.
There are many ways to decorate your basket and you can make it as grand as you want, as long as you have the materials to hand. If you do not have enough materials, you can use the basic steps below to make a simple basket. You can insert cardboard into the six ang baos before starting the craft as it will help give it rigidity and structure. Please see below for the details.
As for the handle, instead of using ang baos, you can use a long strip of cardboard and wrap it with red colour paper or ribbon.
To make this basket, you will require these materials:
- 16 long rectangle ang baos / red envelopes (approx. 9 cm by 17 cm)
- Cardboard (e.g. using cereal boxes)
- Red paper
- Ruler
- Pencil
- Scissors
- Clear tape
- Double-sided tape
- Stapler & staples
- Strong clear glue
- Optional: fake flower petals/Chinese knot tassel/used ang baos for decoration.
These are the step-by-step instructions:
- To build the structure of the basket, you will need 6 ang baos. As my ang bao measures 17 cm long, I folded it across at 12 cm. Please do your own adjustment depending on the length of your ang baos. Repeat for the rest of the 5 ang baos.
- Cut six rectangles from a cereal box measuring 8 cm by 11 cm. Insert them inside the 6 folded ang baos.
- Tape the inside of the six ang baos vertically and horizontally using the clear packaging tape to form a hexagon shape.
- Turn the hexagon shape over and slot the bottom lids as shown.
- Place the hexagon shape ang bao on the cardboard. Trace the outside of the hexagon shape ang bao with a pencil and cut it out. This will be the base for your basket.
- To cover the hexagon cardboard cut-out, cut out a hexagon shape on a red piece of paper. Stick the red paper on top of the cardboard using double-sided tape.
- To make the pop-out ang baos, you will need 6 ang baos. I folded it across at 14 cm. Repeat for the rest of the 5 ang baos. Stick the double-sided tape on the back of the ang baos on the top and bottom as shown.
- Now stick the pop out ang baos onto the hexagon shape (the structure of the basket).
- Make sure the bottom lids are slotted into place.
- Place the red paper cardboard onto the base of the basket. If you to make the basket more stable, you can tape the bottom lids with some clear tape on the base. I didn’t tape it and it didn’t cause any problems.
- To make the handle, fold 4 ang baos lengthwise and slot them together to form a long tape. I secure them using a staple.
- Staple both ends of the handle onto the basket.
- Now decorate your basket.
What do you think about this ang bao basket? Comment below and let me know. Don’t forget to check out the rest of my Chinese New Year crafts!
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