Boxes and Booze 9/20/25 Boxes and Booze 9/20/25

Looks That Kill

I recently found myself in possession of an incongruous mixture of rare colorful wood, reminiscent of a tiny, beautiful Rubik’s like object, fashioned together into a motley cube.

Boxes and Booze 9/13/25 Boxes and Booze 9/13/25

Lost City

German Jesuit Renaissance scholar and polymath Athanasius Kircher was a prolific academic thought leader of his era, like Leonardo DaVinci. He was known as the “Master of a Hundred Arts”, and his personal wunderkammer (cabinet of curiosities) became what is thought to be the first museum in history.

Boxes and Booze 9/6/25 Boxes and Booze 9/6/25

The Royal Game

Marc Duran, a French business consultant and IT specialist with an interest in “history, architecture, cryptology, brain teasers and puzzles”, decided to embark on a new passion project a few years ago: creating his own perfect puzzle boxes that embody all of his interest.

Boxes and Booze 8/30/25 Boxes and Booze 8/30/25

I Spy

The Spyglass, an immersive adventure story that unfolds and expands with puzzles wrapped in a mystery, rekindles delightful nostalgia and wonder in a uniquely modern meets vintage presentation.

Boxes and Booze 7/31/25 Boxes and Booze 7/31/25

Back in Black

Book themed puzzle boxes are always intriguing to me. I suppose they embody the ultimate symbolism of how a good puzzle box tells a story, of adventure, secrets and reward. It’s a pleasure to get lost in a good book, and a book puzzle box offers that sentiment as a tangible experience.

Boxes and Booze 7/26/25 Boxes and Booze 7/26/25

Hunger Games

Seafaring puzzle adventurers who were equally thrilled, befuddled and impressed by a tiny metal puzzle box that made its way across the world a few years ago have been patiently waiting for their next great “white whale” to surface.

Boxes and Booze 7/19/25 Boxes and Booze 7/19/25

It’s Slow Time!

Tortoise is another beautifully crafted and charming production from Juno, the master of pleasing SD puzzles in wood.

Boxes and Booze 7/12/25 Boxes and Booze 7/12/25

Making Cents

Popular in the late nineteenth century, the “high wheel” bicycle is now better known as the Penny Farthing, a colloquial name derived from its one large and one small wheel, like the large British penny and small farthing coins of the time.

Boxes and Booze 6/21/25 Boxes and Booze 6/21/25

Don’t Stop Me Now

Greatest hits albums are like a mark of true success for a band, having produced enough chart toppers to justify such a compilation in the first place, then taking a victory lap by rereleasing those same songs on one amazing album.

Boxes and Booze 6/14/25 Boxes and Booze 6/14/25

Code Switching

”Cryptography” derives from the ancient Greek, meaning ”hidden writing”.

Boxes and Booze 6/7/25 Boxes and Booze 6/7/25

The Well Tempered Clavier

Johanne Sebastian Bach was one of the most prolific composers of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, during a period of musical evolution known as the Baroque.

Boxes and Booze 5/3/25 Boxes and Booze 5/3/25

Decade

To signify this momentous (A decade! More than 500 boxes! More than 500 cocktails!) occasion in a meaningful way, I’m marking the time with a beautiful piece from my friend Bill Sheckels. The piece was itself a long time coming.

Boxes and Booze 4/26/25 Boxes and Booze 4/26/25

Time Passages

Our man in Hungary, Tamas Vanyo, has of late been dabbling in both puzzle boxes (a relatively new area of exploration for him) and AI (something he has been fascinated with for a long time).

Boxes and Booze 4/19/25 Boxes and Booze 4/19/25

Taking Flight

Mercury was the messenger between the gods and humans, the cleverest of them all, who ruled over commerce, wealth, fertility, good fortune and trickery. What excellent inspiration for a grand and puzzling adventure!

Boxes and Booze 4/5/25 Boxes and Booze 4/5/25

Secret Ingredients

A very special piece of cake, which is nothing of the sort in more ways than one.

Boxes and Booze 3/29/25 Boxes and Booze 3/29/25

Roman Holiday

One of the most iconic scenes from Roman Holiday involves the “Bocca della Verita” (Mouth of Truth), an ancient marble mask likely depicting the god of the ocean.

Boxes and Booze 3/22/25 Boxes and Booze 3/22/25

Knot Again!

Prophesy foretold of this, as prophesy tends to do.

Boxes and Booze 3/15/25 Boxes and Booze 3/15/25

Is there a Doctor in the House

I don’t know why it has taken so long for someone in the Karakuri Creation Group to make a robot, because it seems like a fantastic idea for a puzzle box simply waiting to happen.