Reviewing Puzzles from Black Owned Puzzle Companies

Hi everybody welcome back to karen puzzles, so today’s video is one that i’ve been wanting to make for a while. Now i’m going to be reviewing puzzles from five different black owned puzzle companies. If you want more information about why it’s so important to support black owned businesses, i’m going to put some resources down in the description, so i really encourage you to go. Read those if you you know want to do a little research here at karen puzzles, i always want to uplift. People of all races genders orientations.

Physical abilities. This is a safe space, because, like can you imagine, trying to gatekeep jigsaw puzzles get out of here. Jigsaw puzzles are something that everybody should be able to enjoy and see themselves reflected in both the artwork. That’S on the images and also the people running these companies. Alright.

So let’s take a look at this puzzle from apostrophe puzzles. Can we just like? Can we just with how beautiful this illustration is as soon as i saw it online? I was just like that’s the one that i need. It is so colorful, alright.

So here’s what the box looks like and i just like – i just can’t even it’s so beautiful. I love that right here on the front they call out that is black owned women owned and 100 recyclable. Three things that we love here at karen puzzles. So here is what the sides of the box look like really well designed. This is definitely something that you could just have out as a piece of decor, and then here is what the back looks like again, really nicely designed very clean, very modern.

The puzzle is actually a square, so here we can see the entire design and then there’s also a blurb about the artist. So you can pause that if you want to read that entire thing – and i also love that it comes with a handwritten note – i just feel like that’s always like such a special touch for any small business, [ Music ], all right so right here on the Front um we have another little postcard with the entire design and then we’ve got our pieces. So let’s take a look: [, Music ]. So the very first thing that i’m noticing about these pieces is that they’re all very tall. You can see there that you know they make very tall rectangles, and this is a ribbon cut puzzle.

So we have all of the standard piece shapes they’re, just very long, which you know is not a bad thing. It’S pretty unique. I don’t think i’ve really seen that before the pieces are really colorful. It’S a really nice finish. It’S not it’s actually completely matte they’re, not shiny at all.

It’S not the thickest cardboard i’ve ever seen, but you know not really thin either just pretty average totally fine and the pieces just feel really nice in my hands. I’M also noticing that there’s basically no puzzle dust. Look at that! There’S no dust here in the middle [: Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music ], all right, so i just finished the edge. And can we just look at these colors?

They are giving me life, i’m really impressed so far with the quality of this puzzle. The pieces you know stay together when you lift them up, they lock together pretty tightly so that you can move sections around since the pieces are matte um. This is something that happens any time that you have matte pieces. They unfortunately don’t slide over each other. Very well so sorting through all of these pieces is like slightly more challenging than glossy pieces, but you don’t have to worry about light reflecting off of them and like not being able to see what you’re looking at.

So it’s just a trade-off. Looking at the image, this is actually a pretty difficult level image, because there aren’t huge sections of color separation, there’s a lot of little elements like all right on top of each other, just kind of randomly organically placed. So there are definitely a few things that i think i can pull out like these purple flowers here these white lines over in the corner. Maybe these leaves with the pink stripes on them, but i am definitely expecting this to be a bit of a challenge, but definitely a fun one, because the colors are just so beautiful: [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music ], all right. So i’m about four hours into this puzzle, i’m definitely making progress.

I’Ll, probably finish it within another hour or so, just as i suspected it is pretty difficult, especially after you get all of the like, really distinct sections done um. I definitely slowed down at this point because it’s one of those puzzles where, instead of separating all the pieces into sections, you basically just have to look at the puzzle, pick a spot and then find the piece and then put it in place and then move on To the next spot and find that piece and put it in place so, as you have seen from the time lapse, i have been all over the board on this puzzle. You know i’m not just working my way across section to section, because the sections are not clearly defined. It actually reminds me a lot of this one puzzle that i did from pomegranate a while back, although this one is definitely easier than that, one was because the colors are a lot brighter and then the art style also reminds me of the puzzle that i did By lemonade pursuits over christmas, but that one was a little bit more of a gradient so that one was a little bit easier than this one [ Music ] is [ Music ]. So this puzzle took me about five hours in total and i loved doing it.

The artwork is beautiful, all of the colors i just can’t get enough. Unfortunately, you can’t really pick the whole thing up. It’S like slightly too loose for that, but you can move sections around, which is very handy. I think this would be a beautiful puzzle to hang on the wall and kind of be the centerpiece of a room, so apostrophe puzzles was founded by manny and dante. They currently have four puzzles in their current collection, which i’ll put on screen, so you can see all of them so make sure to go check them out [, Music, ].

So moving on our next puzzle is from dope pieces. This puzzle is called equilibrium by alexandre quito, so let’s go ahead and open it up. Look at how beautiful that illustration is. It is so regal and in terms of being a jigsaw puzzle, there’s a lot of different areas of color. That will be relatively easy to separate out.

Here is what the box looks like. You know nothing too, fancy just giving you all of the information that you need on the back. They have the full image once again, as well as a bio of the [ Music ] artist. So here is a close-up and i’m actually kind of curious where they got these made, because the size and the shape reminds me a lot of the area. Wear puzzles, which is a factory that, if you remember, has made puzzles for a lot of different companies, but they have kind of a paper backing.

It makes me feel like this could have been printed double-sided if they wanted it to which is similar to what the gallison puzzles. You know how they’re printed either way here you can see the thickness of the cardboard. Here’S um the back of the puzzle piece and then i hate to do this, but i feel like for a puzzle review. I do need to point out everything that i see and unfortunately the image looks um pretty pixelated. That is something that i have seen like.

Occasionally, with other puzzle companies – and you know it’s just a little too bad, but you know i can still see the image. That’S on the pieces, so i’ll still put together the puzzle and i’m sure it’ll still be fun. Also, i should say the finish is pretty glossy, so, unlike the first one which is matte, the pieces are sliding over each other really well. So let’s go ahead and get started: [ Music, ], [, Music ]. So, as you can see, one of my main strategies with this puzzle was separating out all of the outline pieces and creating the outlines before i filled in all of the different colors.

Since a lot of this puzzle is so dark that just really helped define what pieces i was even looking for: [ Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], all right, so that took me almost exactly two hours and i literally got like halfway through before. I realized that all of the pieces are the standard puzzle piece shape. There is no variation. You can tell whether a piece is horizontal or vertical because they’re, you know enough of a rectangle, but i just thought that was interesting. It’S a little unusual to only have one puzzle piece shape.

Also, the grays were not nearly as hard as i thought, because you have a lot of cool grays versus warm grays and like darker areas and lighter areas so that all went together. Fine. But it was definitely more of a challenge because the image quality is so low, so you’re missing a lot of the details within the image and it’s just such a shame, because the artwork is so beautiful that i wish i could really enjoy it. Instead of seeing all of the pixelization and all of the artifacts, i hope that this company can put in some better processes for scanning or photographing at the artworks, but i will definitely be keeping an eye on them because yeah, i think the curation is really nice. Also check this out the pieces hold together really well.

I can literally lift up the entire thing all at once, so that’s a plus all right. So after i filmed all of that, i got in touch with chris, who is the founder of dope, puzzles to talk about it, and she very kindly offered to send me another puzzle from her company so off screen. I put together two reflections by alvin dante yarborough. This one is definitely higher quality; it doesn’t have the same pixelization and artifacts as the first one, but unfortunately it’s still just like a little bit soft. I feel like it just needed to be a little bit higher quality, but you know from a distance.

It looks totally fine. I did find that kind of the center of the image looked a little bit more sharp than sort of the outer parts of the image. So i actually could use the sharpness on the piece to kind of figure out where on the puzzle it was going to go. I mean even at only 500 pieces. The brushstrokes are abstract enough that i was ready to use any hint that i could find to help me put it together.

So you know it’s tough, because i think the mission behind this company is great. I think these two pieces of art are beautiful, but at the same time i want to make sure that, i’m being honest with all of you about the product that you’ll be getting the quality difference between these two puzzles is fairly substantial, and i just can’t speak To any of the other puzzles from this company, because i haven’t tried them and i haven’t seen them so i just hope that i’ve been fair in showing you all of the pros and cons of all of these puzzles. [, Music, ], all right. So our next company is puzzles of color. This is a 500 piece puzzle.

The artwork is called priceless and it is by melrick steele. When i saw this one online, i knew that this is the image that i wanted to do. You know that i love anything with a colorful rainbow background, and i think this illustration is just so beautiful. One thing that i love about this company is how strong their branding is. So look at this like beautifully designed logo and then they have this color scheme.

That goes all the way around the box and they also have this. Thank you card with the same color scheme. I think everything is really well designed, and i am just so impressed by all of this. Also on the box. They have a bio of the artist as well as the artist’s social links, there’s a little blurb about the company and then part of the picture and then just your standard side of a puzzle box and then nothing is on the back.

So, let’s open this up ooh so inside we got a sticker again with that same color scheme. I love it, i’m obsessed and then of course we have our puzzle pieces. Oh my gosh, i literally just went to cut this bag open and then i realized that it is a resealable, basically a ziploc bag that is so handy so grabbing one of the puzzle pieces. You can see that it has a slight sheen to it, but they’re really not too shiny. Here you can see the thickness about average normal puzzle, piece thickness and then the cardboard on the back all of the pieces seem to have these kind of swoopy little knobs.

So that should be fun to put together and looking through these, i’m really only seeing edge pieces and then standard piece shapes i’m not seeing any other piece shape, which is fine for a 500 piece puzzle with all the colors in this one. It should still be very doable, but that’s kind of unusual and the dope pieces puzzle had the same thing so to have two of those in one puzzle. Video is pretty rare, so i’m already loving all of the colors that i’m seeing i’m going to start sorting and get started on the puzzle: [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music, ], all right! So, even with all of the colors the line work on this one made it a little more challenging than i was expecting, but you know super fun, so colorful – and i just think this illustration is so joyful and so beautiful also look what i found it holds Together really really well like you can literally pick the entire thing up, but move it all around. The entire thing, fully locks together, so puzzles of color was founded by william and erica right.

Now they have nine puzzles available on their site and they also have bios of all of their artists on their site. I think they’ve curated a really nice collection of artwork and, as i said earlier, i think their branding is on point. So i cannot wait to see what they come out with next, so next up, we have two kids puzzles. First up is a puzzle from puzzle huddle. I talked about them in my christmas gift guide video, so you might have already seen their puzzles, but i wanted to feature them again here because i think their mission is so important.

This is the future veterinarian puzzle. It is 200 pieces, which is the largest size puzzle that they offer and all of their puzzles feature illustrations like this of different jobs that kids can aspire to with you know, kids, who look like them doing those jobs. I think for kids puzzles, especially the images that they take in are so important to their development, especially with jigsaw puzzles, because you know you’re looking at the image for a really long time and like interacting with it. So if we open this up, you can see that the pieces are very large. As i said, this is a kids puzzle.

Oh my gosh, this puzzle is huge 19 and a half inches by 27 and a half inches. This is gon na like take up my entire table. The pieces are really high quality, they’re, really thick cardboard, they feel really solid. The finish is a bit glossy and not like super shiny, but a little bit glossy and just look at how bright and colorful these pieces are like. I think any kid would love this, so i’m not expecting this puzzle to take me very long, but let’s go ahead and try it and see how it goes.

[, Music, ], [, Music, ], [, Music ]. This puzzle is so cute, as i expected at only 200 pieces. It did not give me any trouble at all, but the colors are so vibrant. The illustration is so detailed that there’s stuff happening on almost every single piece, so i think any kids would love this puzzle. I really only have one complaint and that is that the pieces don’t lock together, so i mean you can see here.

I try to pick it up and it all just kind of comes apart. You can’t move sections around, but other than that. I just think this is such a high quality puzzle with a really great message behind it. So puzzle huddle was founded by matthew and marnell, and their instagram is so uplifting and inspiring. I’M going to make sure to link that right down below on their website.

They have puzzles that range from 15 to 200 pieces and they also have the same illustrations on shirts, blankets, throw pillows. I showed these two puzzles in my christmas gift guide, video and everything. I’Ve seen from them is as high quality as i was hoping. So you know, i think these would be really great for any kid [, Music, ] and finally, the last puzzle that we’re gon na look at today is from little likes kids. They have been a huge supporter of my channel and my instagram page for a really long time, so i’m so excited to try out one of their puzzles.

Their puzzles are really easy to get your hands on because they’re all on amazon, prime and i tried to find the biggest puzzle that i could. This one is 72 pieces, so these are definitely for much. You know younger kids, so here is what the box looks. Like how fun is that, like this would be right at home in any kid’s playroom? So i actually love how the cover just hinges up um.

It means that your kids cannot lose the two parts of the box and then inside we have another bag of pieces. Oh my gosh, i love that look at how they have the logo on the back. So in a way that turns it into a double-sided puzzle, because if you just did it from the backside, this would turn into a much more difficult puzzle. So you know it can grow up with your kids as they become little puzzlers. So here is one of the pieces um.

You can see that it’s a little bit glossy or a little bit shiny and not like super super glossy. It’S made out of a really thick cardboard and then, as i said on the back, you have the logo so at only 72 pieces again. I don’t think this is going to be much of a challenge, so i came up with a little um. You know challenge for myself. What i’m going to try to do is do the edge and then fill in the pieces in order all the way across.

So let’s see how that goes. [ Music, ], [, Music ] do [ Music ]. Once again, that one was so cute and i did it entirely in order, so this one actually seems to hold together a little bit better than the last one. Let’S see yes, i managed to flip the entire thing over so there’s the back. You can see that again.

This could be its own jigsaw puzzle in itself, and i just think this illustration is so fun and it’s so important for kids to be able to see themselves in the images that they’re consuming and aspiring to so little likes. Kids was founded by kemi and they make products for kids, six and under along with puzzles. They also have different types of games for really young kids they’re. All in this same colorful, fun, illustration style and, as i said earlier, all of their products are really easy to order off of amazon. So i hope this video could introduce you to some new companies that you might not have heard of before.

Of course, i’m going to have links to all of the puzzles that i talked about right down in the description. I would love to know if you’ve ever done any of the puzzles from any of these companies and what you thought of them, and i also wanted to mention, even if you’re not in the market, to be buying new puzzles, because the prices are a little bit Higher, since these are small businesses that aren’t working in such large volumes as like, the huge companies you might be used to something that is totally free, is for you to follow all of these companies on instagram and share their posts, interact with them, really just support Them online and, of course, you can go even further and find the artists that they work with and follow the artists as well so stay tuned for more puzzle videos very soon, and because you watched all the way to the end, your code word is going to Be island because this one was my favorite of all of them happy puzzling and i will see you all in the next one. You