Ecopeco's New Non-Slip Surface - Should You Get It?

A short while back we introduced an additional type of surface to our cutting mats – a non-slip surface made from eco-friendly, non-toxic silicone dots. It’s an optional extra when purchasing your ecopeco® cutting mat, and you might be wondering whether it’s worth adding. In this article we'll explain it more and who might benefit from it.

| A view of the non-slip silicone surface on Berry Bliss

If you run your finger over the non-slip surface it feels like very faint little bumps, evenly spread out. Due to the silicone they have a slightly soft texture, which gives it the grip. This could be useful for certain types of materials used in arts and crafts projects, or if your desk surface is of a slippery nature.

For me, I have never thought I needed this extra grip, because my desk surface is grainy polished wood so the regular mat sticks to it no problem. It’s worth noting that the regular ecopeco® surface already has a light natural texture and grip, so many users find it perfectly stable without the silicone option. But our team at ecopeco® realised that other people might have more smoother surfaces like a marble countertop, or a glossy coated desk. In this case, the extra grip from the silicone would be helpful to keep the mat in place while you're pushing and pulling and scraping and scratching at things while doing your crafting. 

| The regular ecopeco® cutting mat still has its own fair amount of texture and grip which might be fine for most people.

I also don't work with fabrics much, I work with mostly paper and cardboard, as well as  general picking and scratching and poking at things. For this, again, the regular is just fine as it has a certain amount of texture and grip as it is. However, if you do work with fabric it does help to have that little bit extra tension to keep your fabric in place as you cut through it. Quilters, dress makers, costume makers, textile artists and sewists in general may appreciate the added stability.

It should be mentioned that our non-slip surface is only on one side of the mat (the dark side). This allows you to make more choices about how it will help you. It could be placed face-down so as to get a better grip on your desk surface; or it could be placed face-up to get some grip on your materials that you're crafting with. Either way, it can be switched, and you are not committed to always having it as your face-up surface. Another thing to mention is that this non-slip surface is only on our Inches mats, not the Metric ones (we'll see how much demand there is from our Metric friends and consider this in the future).

| The Non-Slip surface seen on Mocha Brown. The silicone dots are only applied to one side of the mat, in this case the darker browner side (not the lighter brown side on there side)

With hundreds of different materials and types of crafters and hobbyists out there it really comes down to what materials you generally use in your projects, and what your surface is like. Give these two things some consideration, and you might just end up preferring the new non-slip ecopeco® surface. Many customers have said they really like it, and need it, whilst others, like me, are happy to go on with our regular surface ecopeco® mat because it's doing a such a fine job as it is.