Uwe Mèffert

Uwe Mèffert's Pyraminx

Uwe Mèffert (born 28 November 1939)^[1] is a German puzzle designer and inventor. He has manufactured and sold mechanical puzzles in the style of Rubik's Cube since the original Cube craze. His first design was the Pyraminx – which he created before the original Rubik's cube was invented – and his others include the Megaminx, Skewb and Skewb Diamond.^{[citation needed]} More recently he has licensed and re-released designs from other manufacturers, such as Dogic.^{[citation needed]}

In the 1970s Mèffert created some puzzles for his own amusement using pieces of balsa wood attached to a center ball by rubber bands.^{[citation needed]} He did not think anyone else would be interested in them, and put them away and forgot about them until Ernő Rubik's Rubik's Cube became a worldwide sensation in the 1980s. In 1981 Mèffert took his puzzles to a Japanese toymaker who agreed to market them. One of them, Pyraminx, sold more than 10 million pieces that year, and 90 million within three years.^[1] Since that time, Mèffert and his associates have created more than 100 3D rotating mechanical puzzles.^[1]

Mèffert also created his own version of sudoku, the popular nine-number print puzzle. In addition to the standard sudoku rules, the two major diagonals must also contain the numerals from 1 to 9. Additionally, a Chinese magic square is hidden somewhere in the solution. He named this puzzle Kokonotsu, Japanese for nine.^[2]

Mèffert has also produced puzzle designs by Tony Fisher, including the Golden Cube,^[3] and Oskar van Deventer, including the Gear Cube.

Biography[]

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Mèffert was born in Wernigerode in the Harz Mountains of Germany on the 28 November 1939. Mèffert is the son of Otto Oscar Wilhelm Rudolph Mèffert and Emmy Johanna Frieda Von-Vorkauf.^[1] He was educated in Heidelberg, Germany, Geelong, Australia, and Bern, Switzerland. He has lived in Asia since the 1970s and currently resides in Hong Kong.^{[citation needed]} He is married to Jing Mèffert; they have three children: Michelle, Andrew and Ulrich and two grandchildren, Mikaela and Zachary.^[1]

References[]

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