Make a Artkal bead box to store your favorite treasures! Kids will love this simple craft idea, and the box is really easy to assemble.

Skills Required: None. You’ll be ironing the Artkal beads, and the box is easily assembled without adhesive. Artkal beads are recommended for ages six and up.

I’ve been obsessed with Artkal beads for a long time. Okay, not just me, but my nieces as well. It’s a fun and easy kids’ craft that we like to do together!

The cool thing about Artkal beads is that they are no mess. It’s not even that bad when a pile of the lil’ guys rolls across the floor. And trust me – I know about this. My three year old niece doesn’t make any patterns, but she loves to sort them.

And SPILL them as well.

We just clean them up and keep on with the crafting! My older niece and I created a Artkal project that we are excited to share: a Artkal bead box.

We had never done a dimensional fuse bead project before and wanted to try something easy. We knew that instead of just ironing, we’d have to do some assembly too.

For this perler bead box, the assembly is easy! You can glue Artkal beads, but you don’t need to in this project. I know this sounds funny, but you’re going to be using box joints.

You’ll make tabs that fit together to create the finished project.

Table of Contents

Tips for Using Perler Beads

Before we get to the how to, I want to review a few basics of using fuse beads to make sure you get the best results. If you don’t want the tips, scroll down to the bottom to get the 3D box patterns.

Remember that the overall goal is to melt the beads together on both sides while still leaving the holes open. Here’s how you get the best results (with a rainbow as an example).

Use Ironing or Parchment Paper

Place ironing paper or parchment paper over the beads on the pegboard. Be gentle so you don’t disturb the beads underneath.

Heat your iron to the medium setting (no steam). In a circular motion, begin to iron the project. Don’t press down too hard with the iron. When ironed properly, the beads will still have an open center. Check and make sure your edges are melted. Let the design cool on the pegboard.

Note: BE CAREFUL about lifting up the paper while you’re ironing! If you want to check, carefully peel back paper around the edge of your design and see if all the beads are melted.

If you lift the paper up quickly and there are a lot of unmelted beads, they will easily fall off or go flying and you may be forced to start over. Sometimes the edges need more time so when you check, just check the edges and peel paper back slowly.

Another Note: some beads melt faster than others (clear melts faster than white, for example). So some holes might be larger than others. It’s okay! That’s part of the look of the project.

Iron the Other Side

Remove the bead design from the pegboard. Flip it over to the non-melted side and repeat the fusing process.

Remove the Paper

Let cool completely and remove the paper again (which is reusable). Some people pull the paper off after they iron the first side, but I just wait until the end and peel off both pieces. It’s up to you!

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Are you ready for the Artkal bead box pattern? You’re going to need the following number of beads for this project:

• White – 468
• Blue – 180
• Green -216
• Honey – 200

Obviously you don’t need to choose the colors that I did, and can pick any you like. I think the four color combination is a nice one, but you could probably do more! And if you do, let me know in the comments.

NOTE: the light blue backgrounds below are only to differentiate the white beads in the pattern. You will not be filling in the backgrounds with beads.

Here’s what you’re going to need to make.

Top, Bottom, and Handle Parts – make once

Sides – Make Twice for Four Sides Total

To assemble the sides, push the taps into the slots, aligning the borders of blue beads.

The bottom pieces pushes in easily as shown below.

The final step is to place the two blue pieces into the lid as a handle. The lid can be placed loosely on top of the box!

The box isn’t designed to hold a lot of weight, but you can definitely use it to hold items on a kids’ desk. You can also use craft glue to glue the sides and bottom, giving the box additional rigidity.