- [Luca] I build models sometimes with weird materials.

I've always found aviation to just be really kind

of magical just because airplanes are engineering marvels.

And I wanted to marry that

with the unconventional building technique.

- [Announcer] This Great Big Story was made possible

by Geico.

Believe it.

Geico could save you 15% or more on car insurance.

(xylophone music)

- [Luca] For my day job I work in IT and management.

but I've just always been creatively-minded.

I've always been drawn to those kinds of projects.

I've been making things since I could figure out

what tape and string were.

I was super young.

I probably drove my parents crazy.

I'm best known for the paper airplane models that I make.

What I use to build the models is manila folder,

glue,

an X-ACTO,

and a straight edge, essentially.

It's hard to know exactly how many folders I've gone through

but I would say it's in the hundreds for this project,

and there's a lot of scrap left over.

I kept it to a minimal set of materials

just because I like the challenge of building something

from only one thing and having to figure out how

to make that serve many purposes.

The model began on a much less detailed scale.

But I did, over time, realize

that I could start building in more.

Articulating functions,

more details in the interior.

And inside there are tissues in the bathroom.

There are lights on the seats.

Nothing actually moves in the cabin

but all the detail is there.

I've always just found the triple seven

to be a really elegant,

nicely proportioned plane.

And so it was partly an issue of aesthetics.

I've always just been a fan of that particular model.

I studied pictures online.

Some technical drawings.

I actually create my own plans,

and there's just no guide for how to do that,

so I'm basically learning along the way.

It's simultaneously kind of freeing

and also really frustrating not to have plans.

I can really take it in any direction.

But you have to be incredibly inventive about

how you solve problems because it really hasn't been done.

A lot of people probably think that my end game

was absolute perfection with the model,

but in fact it was more just about the process of making it.

It's the thought of the completed product

that inspires me and just being able

to solve such a complex problem.

It's just what I derive a lot of satisfaction from.