Kaleidoscopic toy

Abstract

The present invention is an improved kaleidoscopic toy which has no moving parts and which provides a plurality of reproduceable optical shapes and patterns. The improved kaleidoscopic toy is a cube having six inner sidewalls, each of which has a mirrored surface with a plurality of transparent areas which are of a variety of shapes and which are colored with a stain glass paint of any one of a variety of colors. The cube is formed from six identical flat, square-shaped pieces of a transparent material, either plastic or glass. A first layer of mirror backing paint is applied to the outer sidewall of each of the six identical flat, square-shaped pieces and is interrupted only by the plurality of transparent areas of the mirrored surface. A second layer of dark paint is applied over the first layer. The transparent areas of the mirrored surface are formed by using a variety of cut-out shapes as masks when the layer of mirror backing paint is placed on the outer sidewalls of the cube. A layer of stain glass paint is applied to these transparent areas. The improved kaleidoscopic toy also includes a plurality of circular transparent areas in the corners of at least two of the six inner sidewalls in order for a person to view the mirrored surface and to experience the multi-colored optical shapes and patterns of the kaleidoscopic toy.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.