How Jigsaw Puzzles Developed

Jigsaw puzzles are an unusual yet enduring pastime and have an interesting history. Originally, wooden jigsaw puzzles were manufactured as early as the middle of the 18th century in England and, because they were cut by saw, did not fit very well and did not have standard puzzle shapes. A wooden board with a picture painted on it would be clamped and a jigsaw used to saw the picture into odd shaped pieces. Although the jigsaw would be able to cut precisely there would still be sawdust which would mean parts of the image would be lost and the assembled puzzle would fit together loosely.

Early European family crests were often painted in oil onto wooden decorative shields and painting on wood has a history that is hundreds of years old and dates back to Roman times when the deceased often had their likenesses painted onto their coffin lids. It is difficult to accurately determine the circumstances whereby someone decided to cut up a perfectly good picture into small puzzle pieces only to re-assemble them as a completed jigsaw puzzle. No doubt the challenge appeals to the problem solving skills of the hobbyist’s nature. Be that as it may the hobby of jigsaw puzzle making has an ever growing enthusiast base and is over 250 years.

It is worth noting that old fashioned world maps are a still popular theme of puzzle hobbyists and this is due to John Spilsbury. Around 1760 Spilsbury, a London mapmaker, started up the commercial enterprise of jigsaw puzzles. The idea was to sell Spilsbury’s world maps to children as a collection of cut up shapes painted onto wood. Here was the seed that appeals to the problem solving skills of the hobbyist’s nature. By assembling the puzzles, country by country, children would be able improve their geographic knowledge and also improve their visual skills.

Although the countryside panorama is still a mainstay of the puzzle producer’s catalog, cityscapes such as the New York skyline, are also very fashionable. As an alternative to the abundance of photographed themes, Gibsons Puzzles focus primarily on using original hand painted pictures of English life from the last two hundred years from farm life to Victorian Christmas scenes to British automobile dioramas from the 1950’s. There is a puzzle enthusiast for every jigsaw puzzle no matter how challenging. Adult puzzles start from 250 piece puzzles with the 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle being the most popular. There are even all white puzzles for the most committed jigsaw puzzle hobbyist. Despite their high cost, there is still a demand for wooden puzzles.

Given the unevenness of cut of those early wooden puzzles, not to mention labour costs involved, it did not take long before the materials used in puzzle manufacture took a huge change of direction. Puzzles today are, for the most part, made of a high density cardboard known in the trade as greenboard and are fully interlocking which means that once correctly fitted together the whole array of connected pieces will move together as one. The board has an image printed onto it and the board is then passed through a press with a puzzle die that exerts over 200 tons of pressure to ensure a clean, uniform and fully interlocking cut. It is the steel die which does the cutting through the board. Making these dies is an expensive undertaking but a 1000 piece puzzle die will last for years. 1000 piece puzzles are actually made up of 1026 pieces and are the best selling jigsaw size.

No two puzzle pieces in close proximity should be the same shape. There are 14 basic jigsaw puzzle piece shapes that range from pieces with four knobs to the zero knob pieces which will have four indentations. There is every permutation in between, e.g. three knobs to one indentation, etc. Shapes can vary in basic structure from square to oblong again employing the complete range of knob/ indentations. 1000 piece puzzles are actually made up of 1026 pieces and are the best selling jigsaw size.

Given the small size and seeming impossibility of assembling a thousand puzzle pieces freshly spilled onto the work surface it is worth employing some basic puzzle techniques developed by puzzle hobbyists. Lining up the same shaped jigsaw puzzle pieces with the same orientation allows you to focus more easily on a particular knob, hole or corner shape. When it comes down to trial and error, this also allows you to try the jigsaw puzzle pieces in a logical order. Some jigsaw puzzle’s pieces are very similar in shape, at least along two or three of the sides. It is often possible to put a puzzle piece in the wrong place, especially when dealing with solid colours, only to find it was the wrong puzzle piece. If you turn the jigsaw puzzle pieces over and study them from the back without the puzzle picture as a distraction, it is easier to see if the puzzle pieces fit together or not.

The 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle is the most popular jigsaw puzzle size. Catering to the most extreme puzzle enthusiast, puzzle companies make puzzles which have 24,000 pieces. They are over 5 feet high and over 14 feet wide and can occupy a puzzle team up to twelve months. The puzzle hobbyist can hone his or her puzzle skills in competition where contests are conducted by jigsaw puzzle manufacturers and prizes for the fastest puzzle assembly. It would take a competitor about an hour to make a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle.

About the Author:

Superb range of unique jigsaws not widely available in shops.
1000 piece jigsaw puzzles and 500 piece jigsaw puzzles across several themes including Christmas jigsaws and scenes of England