How I do large piece count puzzles in limited space

This was so helpful for figuring out how to tackle my new 8000 piece puzzle in our townhome. I haven’t done more than 1000 pieces until now. I’ve decided to go the foam board route! Thanks so much for sharing :) this has turned an overwhelming process into an exciting new experience for me!

This is such a helpful video! Thank you so much Vicky for taking the time to make it and upload it!

I am puzzling for 20+ years and the biggest puzzles I have ever made had 2000 pieces. For almost 4 years now, I had a general idea that "some day I would like to make a giant puzzle". Lately, I am really considering to take the step and go for it, but I was worried about many things. You literally have answered all of them! So THANK YOU!

Till the end of this year or beginning or the next one, I will sure go for it and I will be totally prepared of what to expect. And seeing that the puzzles of 13200 pieces from Clementoni are coming into 6 bags of 2204 pieces (yes, I also watched your Disney Orchestra videos, loved them), I will probably start with one of that collection (The Disney orchestra or New York, haven't decided yet). All the other big ones I have checked and want to make, even if they are separated into bags, they have too many pieces in each section so, I don't want to stress myself that much on my first giant puzzle. I want to finish it and not give up out of frustration.

So, thank you again and I am looking forward to watch your other videos as well. Especially the ones with the giant puzzles. Have fun and keep puzzling! 😊

I"m currently doing a 4000 piece Casterland puzzle. It is in three bags. One has a red tear strip, one a green and one nothing on the tear strip to open each bag. Are these bags the left, middle and right side of the puzzle or just mixed in 3 bags? I can't find the answer to this. Can anyone help?

Very helpful. Thx.

Wonderful advice. Thank you on space advice....lol

Brilliant. Will now tackle my 6000 piece clemontoni Mickey Mouse puzzle with foam boards.

Thanks for this. I just bought my dream 6k Clementoni puzzle, and working on it half and half will make things so much easier.

This was really helpful. Space isn’t an issue but I’m intimidated and haven’t got past a 1500 yet. Thanks

I find the curvature of the foam core problematic.

I'm doing the Ravensberger 9000 Algiers puzzle. I'm using a 1k puzzle board as my main work station with two foam boards for my loose pieces. From there I'm inserting the large block of pieces onto bigger foam boards on my floor. I hope to bang out as much as possible on the puzzle board because it's so much more comfortable sitting in a chair doing it as opposed to on the floor. I'll have to do parts on the floor anyways. But as little as possible for comfortability is the plan.

I have a question about foam boards. I live in a psace with only small uneven surfaces, and I'm on a small fixed income, so I was thinking about getting a foam board to work on puzzles. I worry about not being able to finish in one sitting though. Do pieces generally slide off of the boards easily? I can't really afford both felt and a foam board, so I'm unsure what a good solution would be for me.

I've recently got into doing jigsaw puzzles and I am addicted. I have been purposely looking for 1000-1500 piece puzzles due to space limitations.
This video has really helped. Thank you for sharing. New subscriber and look forward to seeing more videos.

Thanks for sharing all your tips, it made for a really interesting and educational video.

Another potential resource for finding out the dimensions, number of bags etc for large jigsaws is The List at the 6000 pieces and more blogspot.

I do my big puzzles on a foldable home hobby table . Its 34 5/8" by 36" . It folds down to
13 5/8"by 34 5/8 . Its perfect i also put my puzzles on foam board on the tables.

Thanks for the building tips, Vicky! For me, building just a 1,000 piece puzzle counts as a “large piece count” but I’ll get there. :)
Looking forward to seeing you takle that huge Star Wars puzzle!

I am new to your channel! I am so happy, as a pro puzzler like you, that you made this video, based on your large puzzle experience! I really don't like to constantly swap foam boards even though it was sorted! So my bubble has bursted for large puzzles! I guess I will have to stick to my 1000 to 3000 PC. Puzzles!!! Oh, well.... I am happy to receive your warning about the constant board changing...that was my question I have had for some time!! Thank you!!!

If I had known a lot of this before I bought my big puzzle I would not be so frustrated. for example: I did not know the different bags were the different sections, so mixed everything. (24.000 pieces mixed ! ) and my first sort was wrong. (I didn't look to much at my picture)

This was awesome, thanks so much! My dream puzzle is the 40,320 Disney puzzle and I plan on getting it as soon as it is reprinted, but figuring out how to tackle it has felt quite impossible 🤣 do you tape your foam boards together at all?

if you place them well, you have enough with 6 foamboards for a 9.000 piece puzzle. downside of my layout is that it isn't suited to do it in sections. but if you want to save some money/space... 6 is enough

Oh well that’s exactly what you suggested. Well done me for commenting while watching the video 😁

Great video!

The way I did it. I did a 18000 puzzle with mixed bags on 16 cardboards. I had them under bed and let’s say I was working on «red» pieces or sky pieces. Then I pulled the boards that had those and used the boxes with red pieces or sky sorted in. That way there’s no real limit to how big I can do it and no floorpuzzling which is impossible to me 😅

Interesting to hear what other people do 😊

Thank you for this. It really gives a person some good ideas to consider. Keep them coming.

Thanks for sharing all these useful tips. The largest puzzle that I have completed so far is a 4000-piece one, which can still be fit on the large piece of felt fabric that I bought. Looking forward to seeing the progress of the Ravensburger 9000-piece.

I did the 42k around the world puzzle recently and for each section of 6k~, I used foam boards. I have no space to do the whole thing at once so I ended up splitting each section into 6 parts for each of the 6 boards. It was so much easier to do. I enjoyed it when I finished a sub-section and could keep working on the rest. Once I had finished each section I lay the 6 parts on top of each other so I could store them vertically. It was a huge undertaking though!

I am so looking forward to you putting 9000 pieces puzzle together

I recently bought that 9000pc ravensburger disney museum puzzle too! I really want to put it together but I currently have a 2yr husky puppy who thinks puzzle pieces are snacks so I think I'm going to hold off on doing this one because it wasn't cheap!