A cutting mat is a

mat A mat is a hard or soft floor covering that generally is placed on a floor or other flat surface. Mats serve a range of purposes including: * serving to clean items passed over it, such as a doormat, which removes dirt from the soles of shoe ...

that is placed between a

workpiece A workpiece is a piece, often made of a single material, that is being processed into another desired shape (such as building blocks). The workpiece is usually a piece of relatively rigid material such as wood, metal, plastic, or stone. After a ...

to be cut and the surface below (e.g. a table) to protect the surface. They are used, amongst other things, in hobby work for precise and clean cuts of paper, cardboard or textiles using a

scalpel A scalpel or bistoury is a small and extremely sharp bladed instrument used for surgery, anatomical dissection, podiatry and various handicrafts. A lancet is a double-edged scalpel. Scalpel blades are usually made of hardened and tempered ...

rotary cutter A rotary cutter is a tool generally used by quilters to cut fabric. It consists of a handle with a circular blade that rotates, thus the tool's name. Rotary cutter blades are very sharp, can be resharpened, and are available in different sizes: ...

. They often have grids with a line every 5 or 10

millimeter 330px, Different lengths as in respect of the electromagnetic spectrum, measured by the metre and its derived scales. The microwave is between 1 metre to 1 millimetre. The millimetre (American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, i ...

that can be used to position, aim and measure the workpiece. Examples of uses are textile cutting for

patchwork Patchwork or "pieced work" is a form of needlework that involves sewing together pieces of fabric into a larger design. The larger design is usually based on repeating patterns built up with different fabric shapes (which can be different colors) ...

, or paper cutting for art or

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

modeling. They are also used as a substrate in vinyl cutters.

Materials

Cutting mats are made in various materials.

Vinyl chloride Vinyl chloride is an organochloride with the formula H2C =CHCl. It is also called vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) or chloroethene. It is an important industrial chemical chiefly used to produce the polymer polyvinyl chloride (PVC). Vinyl chloride is a ...

(soft or hard plastic) and

alkene In organic chemistry, an alkene, or olefin, is a hydrocarbon containing a carbon–carbon double bond. The double bond may be internal or at the terminal position. Terminal alkenes are also known as Alpha-olefin, α-olefins. The Internationa ...

are the most common materials. Many mats are somewhat soft and bendable, and some are marketed as having "self-healing" properties. Some mats have a

magnetic Magnetism is the class of physical attributes that occur through a magnetic field, which allows objects to attract or repel each other. Because both electric currents and magnetic moments of elementary particles give rise to a magnetic field, m ...

core. There are also mats made of glass.

Wear

Some cutting mats are marketed as " self-healing", but this claimed functioning is not well documented. Apparently, such cutting mats have the characteristic that stripes from cuts in the mat are not so easily visible. However, this only applies when the cutting blade is moved

perpendicular In geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at right angles, i.e. at an angle of 90 degrees or π/2 radians. The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the '' perpendicular symbol'', � ...

to the surface. Ordinary cuts in the plate itself will therefore often not be very visible in the form of surface irregularities even with repeated use, unless the surface cuts are done in a V shape, which, on the other hand, quickly will leave irregularities that make the mat difficult to use. Cutting mats are usually not heat resistant.

Storage

Some mats do not tolerate sunlight well, and should therefore not be stored in direct sunlight. Mats can bend if they are not stored flat, which may result in them not lying evenly during use.

Size and grids

Many cutting mats are plastic sheets in the sizes A4 (297 × 210 mm) or A5 (210 × 148 mm), but there are also larger sheets in A1 (841 × 594 mm, or possibly 900 × 600 mm) or larger. The thickess is in the order of 3 to 5 mm.{{Cite web , date=2019-11-29 , title=Everything You Need To Know About Self-Healing Cutting Mats , url=https://rhinocuttingmat.co.uk/everything-you-need-to-know-about-self-healing-cutting-mats/ , access-date=2024-02-16 , language=en-US The grid often has divisions with lines every 5 mm or 10 mm.

Improvised variants

For occasional and

ad hoc ''Ad hoc'' is a List of Latin phrases, Latin phrase meaning literally for this. In English language, English, it typically signifies a solution designed for a specific purpose, problem, or task rather than a Generalization, generalized solution ...

work, one can instead use old newspapers, magazines, cardboard or the like instead of a dedicated cutting mat.

Other uses

Cutting boards with grids are sometimes used for scale when taking pictures.

References

Textile arts Quilting