Toolbox : Corner Rounding Punch

Yesterday we had some people over and I got to catch up with a couple of future contributors. We talked about a few tools we had used and hoped to use, and I thought you might be interested to hear our experiences. With any luck, the new contributors will give us a part 2, and as always, I'd love to hear from the rest of you.

I once watched a plucky design student cut 60 rounded corners with an Xacto knife. This is a painstaking process that I will not illustrate for you because it involves too much work and too many accidents. Although I had not been exposed to all of the crafting materials out there, I knew there must be a better way.

One of the major perks to working in a paper store was that we had access to almost all of the tools we sold, and to the wisdom of the older crafters around us. So when I decided to buy a corner rounder for myself, I bought this one...

It's called the "Corner Adorner - Medium Corner Rounder" by EK Success.

Don't expect too much. It can only handle one piece of cover stock at a time, and after a few years (of abuse) some of the flimsy parts in mine broke. However, compared to the quality of most of the craft corner rounders it worked better from the beginning to the end with less finger strength needed. (Some of the others were just plain tough to use.) I replaced the broken punch with an identical one if that says anything.

A Hint- if you have punches like this (or any punches really) there are a couple of good ways to keep them working smoothly. If you punch through aluminum foil (which I usually fold over a few times) it is said to sharpen the blade. Punching through wax paper makes the whole thing move a little smother.

I think that rounded corners can be the touch that makes a paper project, but if you're working on something with quantity make sure you have the necessary finger strength and time to get it done with this little sucker.

In the meantime I am after a magical mystical professional version of the corner rounder to fulfill all my corner rounding fantasies. I have been told I may find it in the far off realm of Ebay...

(Check out this video for a glimpse of one of the great old-school rounders - around 2:05.)