Preserving your completed jigsaw puzzle celebrates your skill, patience and determination. Finishing a jigsaw puzzle gives you a wonderful feeling of accomplishment. This is especially true if the puzzle has more than 1,000 pieces and took you a long time to complete.
It always seems sad to pull the puzzle apart and put the pieces back in the box. At the same time, leaving it assembled on the dining room table indefinitely is not really an option. Preserving the puzzle means it can be framed and displayed so that more people can appreciate what you’ve done.
Framed puzzles are an excellent alternative to hanging pictures or prints on the wall. The wide range of scenes available makes jigsaw puzzles perfect for wall décor. From landscapes to portraits to animals, jigsaw puzzles depict scenes that are colorful and vibrant. You can find everything from classical art masterpieces to animated scenes.
However, the fact that the scene is not merely a print, but is also a puzzle adds new meaning to the scene. First of all, it shows that someone put in some extra effort to actually assemble the puzzle rather than buying a print. The puzzle pieces also lend a more three-dimensional look to the scene as well as adding an interesting pattern effect.
Preserving a puzzle normally starts with gluing the pieces together. Fortunately you don’t have to glue each piece. You start by putting something like wax paper under the completed puzzle. Then you essentially “paint” the glue onto the top of the puzzle. Don’t use just any glue. Decoupage glue is excellent for this purpose. You can also find glues specifically made for puzzle preservation. The glue dries clear so that the beauty of the pictures shines through. At the same time, the glue penetrates the edges of each piece, fusing all of them together. Once the glue has dried, the wax paper backing is removed and the puzzle is framed for display.
