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Celebrations

Free papel picado SVG files

Free papel picado SVG files: flags with a dahlia, two doves and a heart, a sun, a poinsettia, a sugar skull, a vase of flowers, a hummingbird, a prickly pear, a butterfly and a star piñata, a simple flag, a blank one for a name and two strings of small flags. Each flag is one sheet that holds together.

15 designs. Free for personal and commercial use, no sign-up. What you can do with them.

Or choose one below for its PNG, DXF and cutting sizes.

How these flags are built

Papel picado, "pecked paper", is the Mexican craft of cutting pictures into sheets of tissue, traditionally many sheets at once with small chisels and a mallet. The flags are strung across streets, churches and altars for the Day of the Dead, Christmas, weddings and saints’ days. The files here are drawn by code in that manner and are not copies of any maker’s work.

Each flag is 100 mm wide. Along the top is a plain band about 8 mm deep, which folds over the string. Below it the picture stands in a lattice of small holes: squares, diamonds, bricks, dots or a burst of bars. A cut line about 2.3 mm wide runs round the picture so that it reads against the lattice, and the line is left uncut at a ring of ties about 2.7 mm wide, which is what keeps the picture in the sheet. The lattice bars are about 2 mm wide and run unbroken to the border.

Paper, size and hanging

Tissue is what the real thing is made of, but it drags and tears under a machine blade unless it is very well stuck down. Thin paper of 80 to 120 gsm cuts cleanly and still lifts in a draught. Cut the flags at 200 mm wide or more: the bars and ties are then about 4 mm wide, and the flag survives being handled. At 100 mm wide they suit cards, cake toppers and the front of a small altar.

To string them, lay the cord along the top band, fold the band over it and glue it down, leaving a finger’s width between flags. The banner of three flags and the row of five come ready strung, as one piece each, for cards and scrapbook pages.

How to open the files

  • Cricut Design Space: choose Upload, pick the SVG, and add it to the canvas. Set the width you want; the shape is already welded.
  • Silhouette Studio: Designer Edition and above open the SVG. The free Basic Edition does not, so open the DXF instead.
  • LightBurn, xTool Creative Space and Glowforge: import the SVG, then set the layer to cut, score or engrave.
  • Inkscape, Illustrator and Affinity: open the SVG. It is a plain filled path, so you can recolour it, add a stroke or combine it with your own work.
  • Printing or sublimation: use the PNG, which has a transparent background.

Each design page lists the file’s narrowest part at seven sizes, so you can tell whether it will survive at the size you plan to cut.

Questions

Can I cut papel picado from tissue paper on a cutting machine?

You can, with care: press the tissue flat on a clean standard-grip mat, fit a new blade and use the lightest pressure that cuts through. Expect to lose a sheet or two while you find the setting. Thin text-weight paper is far easier, and from a few steps away it looks the same.

How do I put a name on the blank flag?

The oval at the middle is about 54 by 31 mm when the flag is 100 mm wide. Type the name in a stencil typeface, size it to sit inside the oval with a few millimetres to spare, and set it to cut out of the oval. A stencil face keeps the middles of letters such as a, e and o attached.

Which flag is easiest to cut by hand?

The simple flag. It has no lattice: a big eight-petalled flower, four corner fans, five round holes and seven scallops, with wide paper between them. Fold a sheet in half, trace half the design against the fold and cut both layers at once, as children do.

More free SVG files