Free vine SVG files

Thin stems, and how to keep them whole

A vine is a long thin stem, so it is the stem that decides how small you can cut. Here stems are 2.6 mm wide when the file is 100 mm across, and every leaf sits on a short stalk at least 2 mm wide, so nothing is held on by a point. In vinyl the vines work from about 60 mm wide. In card or thin wood keep them at 100 mm or more, and use transfer tape or a backing sheet when you lift them, because a long stem bends easily.

Most leaves have a slit for the midrib. If you are cutting small, pick the hand-drawn outline for pens and foil, or leave the slits unweeded in vinyl and they will hardly show.

Making longer runs and bigger frames

The leafy vine, the border and the corner are drawn so that copies can be joined. Overlap the round ends of two stems by a millimetre or two and weld them, and the join disappears under a leaf or a curl. Four corner vines, each turned a quarter, make a frame of any proportion: slide them apart to fit a rectangle and bridge the gaps with a short length of the leafy vine.

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