A paper is folded twice and punched. How will it appear when unfolded?

To determine how the paper will appear when unfolded, let us trace the folding and punching steps in reverse.

Step 1: Understand the folding process
1. First fold: The bottom half of a square sheet of paper is folded upwards over the horizontal center line to cover the top half.
2. Second fold: The left half of the resulting rectangle is folded rightwards over the vertical center line to cover the top-right quadrant.
3. Punches made: In the folded top-right quadrant, two cuts are punched:

• An L-shaped notch cut near the bottom-left corner of the quadrant (pointing towards the top-right).
• A triangular cut near the top-right corner of the quadrant, pointing inwards towards the bottom-left.

Step 2: Unfold from Right to Left (Horizontal Mirroring)
Unfolding the top-right quadrant to the left reveals the top-left quadrant. This creates a vertical mirror image across the central vertical axis:

• The L-shaped cut near the bottom-left of the top-right quadrant reflects to become an inverted L-shaped cut at the bottom-right of the top-left quadrant. Together, the L-shapes in the top two quadrants open away from the center line.
• The triangular cut at the top-right corner reflects to the top-left corner, pointing inwards towards the center.

Step 3: Unfold from Top to Bottom (Vertical Mirroring)
Unfolding the top half downwards over the horizontal center line creates a horizontal mirror image for the bottom two quadrants:

• The L-shaped cuts near the central horizontal line reflect downwards into the bottom-left and bottom-right quadrants, creating four symmetrically placed L-shaped cuts around the center of the unfolded paper.
• The triangular cuts in the top-left and top-right corners reflect downwards into the bottom-left and bottom-right corners, resulting in a triangular cut near each of the four outer corners pointing inwards towards the center.

Step 4: Conclusion
Comparing the unfolded design with the given options, the pattern containing four inwards-pointing corner triangles and four central L-cutouts matches the correct option.

The correct unfolded paper pattern is represented by: