When the original Cricut maker was launched, it was considered a game changer. It was more powerful than the models from the Explore series. For decades its cutting force was unbeaten. Cricut Maker is the company’s top model and is quite popular among crafters. But to get the most out of your Cricut machine, you need some essential tools and supplies.
As a beginner, you must know the basic tools and accessories compatible with your Cricut Maker machine. To help you and beginner crafters like you, we have compiled a list of must-buy Cricut Maker supplies. For your ease, we have segregated the whole list into three categories.
Must-Buy Cricut Blades
Cricut Maker has a fine-point blade capable of making intricate cuts on various materials such as paper, cardstock, vinyl, iron-on, and more. The blade can handle your everyday cutting needs, so you don’t need to immediately buy a second one. However, if you plan to work with thicker materials such as genuine leather and wood, then you need to buy the following blades:
Deep Point Blade
The Deep-point blade is much stronger than your standard fine-point blade and is designed to cut thicker material such as magnet paper, chipboard, faux leather, thicker cardboard, stiffened felt, craft foam sheets, and more. The blade has a 60-degree angle and can easily cut the abovementioned materials.
Knife Blade
Although the Knife Blade is not included in the box, it is exclusively designed to work with the Cricut Maker series. It can cut thicker materials such as Balsa wood, Basswood, Cricut Chipboard, Soft Garment Leather, Stiff Tooling Leather, and Matboard.
Rotary Blade
Rotary Blade is another exclusively designed Cricut Maker blade. It can more than 100 fabrics, including Canvas, Chiffon, Cotton, Denim, Flannel, Muslin, Nylon, Suede, and more if you can purchase it if you are planning to work with different types of fabrics.
Must-Buy Cricut Tools
As a beginner, you must have five essential tools: a weeding tool, snips, spatula, tweezers, and a scraper. To make things easier for crafters, offer a tool kit for beginners containing all these tools. Besides these tools, there is an additional tool that you can opt for, which can help you a lot in craft making.
Weeding Tool
A weeding tool is a must-have tool if you cut iron-on or vinyl. Using a weeding tool, you can easily apply and weed all types of vinyl. A weeding tool may look like what a dentist might use, but it is designed to remove tiny cuts from the liner.
Spatula
Paper and cardstock are the most widely used crafting materials. For such projects, a spatula will come in handy. Use the thin end to gently lift your paper or cardstock projects so you don’t have to worry about tearing or ripping off your paper or cardstock project.
Tweezers
Tweezers come in handy to weed and clean mats. The tweezers’ fine point lets you hold, lift, and place simple decals without transfer tape.
Scrapper Tool
You will probably use the scraper tool the most of all the tools. The tool removes scrap pieces from the cutting mat or any bubbles from your material. For applying vinyl to large surfaces and clearing large areas of the mat, Cricut offers an XL scraper.
Snips
These small scissors are a must as you will use them very often. You can use them to trim excess vinyl or cut your materials before loading them on the Cricut cutting mat.
Portable Trimmer
Although you can use snips to trim or cut materials, a portable trimmer trims your materials and keeps the lines straight.
Scoring Stylus
The scoring Stylus is a must to make cards or 3D paper projects. It comes in pen form and creates scored lines for cards, envelopes, and more.
Scoring Wheel
Like a knife and rotary blade, a scoring wheel is exclusively designed to work with Cricut Maker. You must know that the Scoring Wheel is better than the Stylus.
Must-Buy Cricut Mats
The Cricut Maker has one pink (fabric grip) and a blue (light grip) Cricut cutting mat. But you can’t have enough as regular use; the Cricut mats start losing their stickiness. You don’t need to buy them immediately, but they are useful. The Cricut Maker is compatible with all the four types of Cricut mats:
StandardGrip Mat (Green)
You can think of it as your go-to Cricut mat, as out of all the mats, you will probably use this mat the most, so it’s a good idea to have a spare. The mat works great with regular crafting materials like paper, cardstock, vinyl, iron-on, and more.
LightGrip Machine Mat (Blue)
The stickiness of the LightGrip Mat is less than StandardGrip mat. It’s ideal for delicate materials such as paper, crepe paper, vellum, light cardstock, and more.
FabricGrip Mat (Pink)
You should only opt for this mat if you work with different types of fabrics. The pink FabricGrip mat is compatible with rotary blades. It has a slightly sticky surface to hold different types of fabric.
StrongGrip Mat (Purple)
As the name suggests, it has the strongest grip strength of all the Cricut mats. Its sticky surface is designed to hold heavy materials such as cardstock, genuine leather, chipboard, glitter card stock, stiff fabric, suede, and more.
Self-healing Mat
Besides the cutting mats, you should also invest in a self-healing cutting mat. A self-healing mat will protect your tabletop while you cut paper with the craft knife or rotary cutter. A standard self-healing mat comes in size 18’x24″, although larger sizes are also available.
FAQs
How is the Scoring Wheel different from Scoring Stylus?
Although they both are scoring tools, they are different from each other. A Scoring Wheel is a single tool that looks like a pen, whereas a Scoring Wheel is two in one tool. The Scoring Wheel has two heads.
Where is the blade and scoring stylus installed in Cricut Maker?
The Cricut Maker features a double tool holder with two clamps. The left clamp is labeled A, and the right clamp is labeled B. All the accessories go into clamp A, where Scoring Stylus is installed. In contrast, all the blades go in Clamp B.
Visit: Cricut.com/setup
Source: Must-Buy Cricut Maker Supplies For Beginners
