Craft Cutters: The Right Slice Tools for Your Next Project
Craft cutters are widely used by artists, crafters, and hobbyists. Here, we take a look at which Slice® cutters work well for different hobbies and crafts. Slice makes several common and some unique craft cutting tools.
What is a Craft Cutter?
Craft cutters cover a wide range of bladed tools used to cut or scrape various types of materials for craft or hobby projects. The tools should be designed to fit well in the hand and have a solid grip to prevent slippage. The blades are sized and shaped to take on particular tasks, be that cutting through tough materials or doing intricate detail work.
Some of the more popular craft tools for cutting:
- utility or hobby knives
- precision cutters
- pen knives
- box cutters
A Safer Craft Cutter for Your Project
When it comes to choosing craft cutters, your blade needs depend on the demands of your particular tasks. Smaller blades are aimed at detail work, while larger blades work better for more robust materials and bigger cuts. The length of the blade is also a consideration: the longer the blade, the deeper it can cut, and vice versa.
All Slice craft cutters include a replaceable blade. We offer models with auto-retraction or manual retraction. For most crafters, a blade that locks in place, like that found with manual retraction tools, will likely be the preferred model.
All Slice safety craft knife blades are finger-friendly®—that is, they are safe enough to touch. While they can cut skin with some effort, they’re far less likely than conventional blades to cause lacerations. The safer experience of Slice cutters makes them an excellent choice for use by children, seniors, and dexterity- or movement-challenged crafters.
Manufacturers of traditional ceramic and metal blades design them to be overly sharp. This convention has led people to associate sharpness with effectiveness, but this is a misconception. Manufacturers make metal blades overly sharp only because metal dulls quickly. Metal is a relatively soft material, and the excessive sharpness extends the life of the blade. Traditional ceramic blades mimic this standardized design and its accompanying danger.
A razor-sharp blade is unnecessary to easily cut common craft materials. Slice blades start at an effective sharpness and stay there much longer. Our unique blade grind and edge design combine to create the only true safety blade.
Slice blades, which are thicker than traditional blades, have the added bonus of being more durable: they keep their safe and effective sharpness up to 11 times longer than steel blades. That’s great value and fewer changed blades.
What types of crafts can our tools be used for? Let’s take a look.
Scrapbooking and Card Making: Choice Craft Paper Cutters
Slice cutters are ideal for any papercraft project, such as scrapbooking and card making.
From the Slice line of precision cutters, the craft knives and the 10580 Precision Knife, with fixed, replaceable blades, are ideal for materials like paper and photographs. This is also true for our three models of ceramic scissors. The scissors are great for long, straight lines or big curves, while the craft and precision knives are more maneuverable. The craft knives will even cut delicate crepe paper nicely, as this video demonstrates:
For finer detail work on thinner materials, including card stock, the Slice 00116 Precision Cutter is your dream come true. It fits in your hand just like a pen and the micro-ceramic blade is incredibly maneuverable. The rubber handle makes for an excellent grip. It’s a gem for cutting intricate shapes and curved lines. See it and the Slice craft blades in use in this video. Note that, since the video was released, Slice has released the 10589 Craft Knife with Never-Lost™ safety cap and the 10548 Craft Knife with removable safety cap.
If you’re making long cuts in thicker materials like cardboard, the Slice 10550 Manual Utility Knife or 10400 Manual Box Cutter are great options.
Scratchboarding
Several scratchboard artists have switched to Slice tools for their precision, safety, and ergonomics. From the article “Scratchboard Tools From Slice: A Welcome Addition to Scratchboard Art”: “Scratchboard artists who already use the Slice tools as part of their arsenal find that the tools make the demanding and tedious process of creating scratchboard art easier, less time-intensive, and less stressful on their hands.”
Slice tools that work particularly well for this art form are the 00116 Precision Cutter, the craft knives, and the 10568 Ceramic Scalpel. See scratchboard artist Paul Hopman using the Slice 10548 Craft Knife in several scenes of this video:
Vinyl Crafting
Many Slice customers enjoy using our tools for vinyl and polycarbonate sheets. These materials are frequently used with stencilling, working with adhesives, and building RC models. The Slice 10580 Precision Knife and 10568 Replaceable-Blade Scalpel provide excellent control, which is especially important when dealing with expensive materials. For less intricate cuts, the micro-ceramic-blade 00200 Safety Cutter and 10583 Safety Cutter Ring both cut through vinyl and polycarbonate while safeguarding fingers and hands.
Leather Crafting
Leather crafters rejoice. Slice blades are great at cutting leather. Master leathersmith Joshua Watts loves his Slice Craft Knife and the Manual Box Cutter. The Craft Knife is ideal for detail work while the Manual Box Cutter is great for cutting long lines on big pieces of leather.
According to Josh, Slice blades make a cleaner cut through leather and require less pressure than metal blades. Also, Slice’s finger-friendly technology means not having to suffer frequent cuts.
For more information about leather craft blades and the benefits of Slice cutters in leathercrafting, see Choosing Leather Cutting Tools that Make the Cut.
Coupon Cutting
While going after the coupon section of your newspaper may not sound very crafty, it’s a hobby shared by many. While savings are great, cut and tired hands are not.
Slice offers an innovative solution with its small but effective mouse-shaped 00200 Safety Cutter. This little powerhouse features a micro-ceramic blade that’ll glide through paper. Its rubberized texture makes it easy to grip and the ergonomic design reduces hand fatigue. It’s so safe, you can even take this cutting tool in your carry-on luggage when you fly.
Slice Craft Cutters in Action
You’re likely getting the idea that for just about any craft that requires cutting, there’s a Slice tool that can do the job. But seeing is believing. So let’s check out a couple more demos of the cutters doing their thing.
Do you like to make stencils with mylar sheets? Slice has several tools that will cut this rigid material, including our ceramic scissors. You can also use a rounded-tip or pointed-tip blade with the 10580 Precision Knife, our pen cutters, or utility knives. The pointed-tip blades work best if you need to initiate the cut with the blade tip. The rounded-tip blades provide added safety. See models of all four tools used here on 10-millimeter-thick sheets.
Slice tools are great for the applique paper and vinyl used in quilting. For the former, the craft knife, the ceramic scissors, and even the ever-handy Safety Cutter work well. For rigid vinyl plastic sheets, the scissors are best. See for yourself.
For those who enjoy airbrushing, the Safety Cutter and Precision Cutter work well on frisket film. This demo shows how the former is great for straight lines, while the Precision Cutter is great for curves and details.
Safe, Durable, Effective Craft Cutters
Regardless of the particular cutting tasks demanded by your favorite craft, Slice makes a precision knife or other cutting tool that will suit your needs perfectly, while helping to protect you from accidental lacerations. Before suffering another cut while creating your beautiful crafts, try a craft cutter from Slice’s line-up of tools. Safe, effective, durable, stylish, and able to cut through a wide variety of materials cleanly, Slice craft cutters are, well, a cut above.
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