Thursday 15 May 2014

Cricut Explore!

Good afternoon!

This is a long post but an exciting one for me as I get to show you the new Cricut Explore. 

I attended the exclusive Cricut Explore launch in London on the 24th April 2014. We got a chance to meet the CEO of Cricut and some of his team and designers, plus the wonderful gals from Ranieri Communications who organised the event. 

The venue was held at Altitude on the 28th floor of Millbank Tower in Westminster. The venue and the views were breathtaking. Drinks, cupcakes and lunch were provided along with a photo booth and two manicurists! 

After presentations from the Cricut team, we had a chance to make and take. It was a fantastic day.

It is available to buy for the first time tomorrow (Fri 16th May) from 8.00am on Create and Craft. If you are not a great fan of Create and Craft, the Explore will be available to purchase from Crafts U Love on 26th May 2014 and from Hobbycraft, Amazon and other craft retailers from June 2014. At the moment you can pre-order from Crafts U Love and Amazon.

Here are a few shots of this gorgeous machine....

Cricut Explore - Closed

Cricut Explore - Dial

Cricut Explore - Open With Cutting Mat

Cricut Explore - Open Angled

Cricut Explore - Open Angled 

Cricut Explore - Marker

Cricut Explore - Cutting

It comes in a beautiful shiny box...

Gorgeous box!

What do you get for your money?

What you get in the box

In the box...

1 x Cricut Explore
1 x storage bag
1 x power cord
1 x USB cord
1 x quick start pack
1 project materials pack (Black and Jade Cricut Cardstock, Silver Cricut Vinyl, White Cricut Iron-on, 2 Duck Tape sheets (colours may vary), Instructions on how to use the Vinyl, Iron-on and Duck Tape)
1 x Standard Grip cutting mat
1 x blade and housing (pre-installed)
1 x pen and accessory adapter (adapter pre-installed)

From opening the box to creating a card using some of the materials from the pack it took about 25 minutes. You need to set up and configure the Explore to your computer and update the firmware. All this is simple and straightforward with easy to follow stages.

So what can you do with the Explore?

You connect to the free online software called Cricut Design Space. This is what you use to create your projects. There are more than 50,000 images and hundreds of ready-to-make projects for you to get started right away.

There are also blank canvases for items such as t-shirts, so you can visualise what you are creating. You can even change the colour of the t-shirt on screen. Another bonus is that now you can upload and use your own images, designs and fonts.

You can now cut and write at the same time which is a great idea if you are making lots of invites. The Explore will cut a wide range of materials from leather to wood veneer!

For those of you who have the Cricut Mini, any digital images/cartridges you have in your Cricut Craft Room will automatically be transferred to the Design Space. A slot is incorporated into the machine so you can use existing cartridges.

Price? 

The machine will retail at £249.99 including VAT. As well as thousands of free images in the Design Space, there are no-commitment subscriptions are available - £7.49 for a month (25,000+ images) or £79.99 for a year. single images will also be available to purchase starting at 79p per image. Pen sets, replacement blades, mats etc. are also available.

In the future Cricut will unveil an app for the iPad, so users can sync and cut with the Explore using Bluetooth.

This machine isn't just for scrap booking or card making. Interior design, clothing, jewellery, household items and furniture can be created or decorated; the only limitation is your imagination.

Here is the card I whipped up using the material pack and one of the ready-to make projects.

If you want more information about Cricut...

View project ideas - http://uk.cricut.com/project

I'll be back soon with another post to show you another card I created with the help of the Cricut Explore.

Until then take care and thanks for persevering with such a long post xxx

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2 comments:

KT Fit Kitty said...

What a lucky duck you are! Awesome! I would love to have a Cricut! Cute card you made!

Berina RGA said...

thanks for the info... I was looking to find information about this and you publish this post!! thank you so much!! I have one more doubt... can we design new images using the software? if yes, is it easy to learn?
-Berina
Moxie Craftie