Prepare Your Primary Material
Prepare your MDF/wood for lasering. We opted to use pre-painted MDF, so all we needed to do was mask one side of our sheets to help protect the surfaces from cutting and engraving residue. If you’re using unfinished material, but would like the final piece to be painted, you can either paint your sheets before masking, or you can paint the components once they’ve been cut out.
Prepare Your Secondary Material
For the stars that will adorn the top of our tree, we applied double-sided tape to the back of our plastic prior to laser cutting. Once applied, the exposed side of the tape is protected with a film we’ll peel off later. When we cut the stars out with the laser, we’ll cut through both the plastic and the adhesive. This means we’ll have even adhesive application across the entirety of our stars. You could also forego the tape at this stage and simply apply tape after the stars have been cut out, but if you’d like to follow our approach, be sure to apply some thin double-sided tape to the back of your plastic before you start cutting with the laser.
Prepare the Artwork
Once you have your materials prepared, make any design or sizing adjustments you’d like to the artwork.
Cut and Engrave the Tree Components
Since the tree components will require two sheets of material, you’ll need to run them using two jobs. Send the jobs over to the machine by printing them from your graphics software. Insert the first sheet of your primary material into the laser. Focus the table to the material, then run the first job for the tree components. Once complete, clear out the work area, then insert your second sheet. Run the second job to create the rest of your tree components.
Cut out the Stars
Insert your plastic into the machine. Send over the stars job from your graphics software. Focus the table to the plastic, then run the job.
Paint and Assemble
After your components have been engraved and cut, apply a few coats of paint to the numbers on the tree. After the paint has dried, peel off the masking.
Then peel off the protective layer of the double-sided tape on the back of your stars and affix the stars to the top of your two main tree components.
Connect the main tree components using the base supports and the top connector.
Place the wine bottles into the tree and enjoy a very merry month!
Where can you sell laser cut wine advent trees?
- To wine/liquor stores
- Specialty gift stores
- To wineries, bars, or restaurants
- Online shops
