DOWNLOAD SVG FILE TO LASER CUT YOUR OWN TINY TEMPLE
Greetings everyone! I was looking for a small altar or tiny temple where I could place my collection of small brass Buddha statues. I have many little Hindu Gods and Goddesses about 1.5″ tall and I wanted little shrines to display them. I looked around and could not find anything small enough, so I designed my own!
This project uses 1/8″ thick proof grade plywood on my Glowforge laser cutter. Mine is made from Cherry plywood with a luscious deep red color to the grain. Due to popular demand, I now offer my SVG file for those who have access to a laser cutter.
The SVG is made in color because Glowforge can see color. For some weird reason the Glowforge defaults engrave and score settings to draft quality, so we have to manually set engrave and score to HD or High Definition Quality for best results. Depending on your laser cutter you may have to change the order of tasks. The laser settings and step order for this design are:
- VIOLET: ENGRAVE as HD Graphic
- BLUE: SCORE (set to HD)
- RED: FIRST CUT
- BLACK: LAST CUT
DOWNLOAD SVG FILE TO LASER CUT YOUR OWN TINY TEMPLE
Once your parts are laser cut it is time to assemble your tiny temple.
Put the Base in front of you, flip it so the JEMTOY logo is on the bottom (so you can’t see it.) Position the two front holes facing you.
Stack the Floor on top, making sure the 4 little holes line up and the laser scored line can be seen.
Insert the bottom tabs of the Window into the back two holes in the Floor and Base.
Do the same thing, insert the Front Door into the middle two holes pegging through the Floor and Base.
Insert the two little Railing pieces into the two little holes remaining on the front creating a mini staircase into the Door.
Slip the 2 Walls onto the tabs protruding from the bottom edge of the Window and Door.
Slide the 2 grooves in the Roof down onto the pegs at top of Window and Door. Push them down so there is a clear groove (for Garuda) on top.
Each Wall has pegs at top to set a Wing. Each Wing arches over the Door or Window.
Hold the top together and put Garuda in place to hold it all together. Garuda fits in the top middle groove in the roof. The openings along the bottom of Garuda snap in place sandwiching the Window and Door to the Wings. NOTE: Do not push on the long extended fragile parts of Garuda, they might break making your tiny temple a little ruin.
The tiny temple will hold most statues 1″ – 1.5″ inches tall. The project could also be a wonderful Fairy House or Spirit House – and you leave it empty for tiny visitors to camp out in when they pass through! If you have a big love for all things small, this is a great project to make with a kid.
DOWNLOAD SVG FILE TO LASER CUT YOUR OWN TINY TEMPLE
