LOL

Designer: Frederic Boucher

This puzzle measures: 70 mm x 85 mm x 25 mm

Material: Jatoba/Cherry

Frederic Boucher wrote about it: 

“LOL is an assembly puzzle with a very simple goal: Assemble the five pieces to make the acronym LOL, respecting the following rule: the 3 characters must have the same size (height and width). Will you discover the trick and succeed in the challenge? Exclusively for the PELIKAN version, a box is included. As a second challenge you must pack the pieces completely into the box. I hope this puzzle will make you laugh out loud!”

Kevin Sadler wrote about it:
“How can anyone resist a new puzzle designed by Frederic Boucher. I certainly can’t and if it’s called LOL then there is guaranteed to be something special about it. This puzzle is very reminiscent of the Galette by Osanori Yanamoto in that there is a small flat box with a limited entry and a set of pieces to insert inside. There’s no window in the front so it will all need to be done with dexterity and gravity along with quite a lot of thought. The puzzle is beautifully made from Jatoba and Cherry with the puzzle name on the surface which I think might be Marquetry (it’s something I’ve never seen from Jakub before). 
 
The 5 simple pieces are to be put inside to make a 4×5 voxel rectangle. It’s made more complex by the fact that the largest piece can’t even fit through the 2 voxel opening – it requires a rotation to get inside and maybe there will be rotations needed inside the box without easy access?
 
There seem to be only a limited number of ways to create the rectangle and some of them are quite obviously impossible. I found a couple that potentially might be possible but finding a way to get them in the box is a huge challenge. The pieces block each other from getting into position and manipulating them through the tiny entrance hole is a frustratingly difficult experience. At one point I had a really good idea and it worked. But then the next step wouldn’t work at all and I had a mini heart attack trying to undo the first supposedly good idea. It took me a good 30 minutes to get the pieces all out again and calm myself down.  There had been quite a lot of swearing during that process and Mrs S kept glaring at me! Having retrieved all the pieces I had a little think© and found myself trying to do the same thing over and over again. At one point, a little experiment with the pieces revealed a very subtle design element and yes, thank you Frederic, I did laugh out loud. A few minutes later I had my assembled puzzle. Subsequently I received the instructions and found there was another challenge to be had.
 
It appeared that I had only done the secondary challenge. The primary challenge still awaited me. This took me another hour or so yesterday and the important thing is to assemble the letters standing up on a flat surface. There is a very special trick that has had be done during the manufacture of the pieces to make it work. Another laugh out loud moment!”