Custom Frames & Borders ⭐ Card Making Countdown 2026

Create beautiful ornate borders and frames for handmade cards with this DIY design tutorial.

Welcome to Day 12 of the 2026 Card Making Countdown.

First, we’ll make the two pre-made designs included with today’s project.

Then, we’ll take a look at this elements kit. This has lots of little shapes on it that can all be brought together to make your own truly custom frames, borders, even bookmarks.

Learn how to design symmetrical projects so that it’s the same either in every corner if you’re doing a frame or top and bottom if you’re doing a straight border design.

Then go one step further by designing your own shaped cards and bookmarks with the same elements kit.

Custom stencil border cards

This project is part of the 2026 Card Making Countdown

Find out more

Frame and border cards: materials supply list

Here is a list of the materials that are used to make this project.

Please note that some of the links included in this article are affiliate links, which means that if you click through and make a purchase I may receive a commission (at no additional cost to you). You can read my full disclosure at the bottom of the page.

This project is suitable for the following types of Cricut machines: Explore series, Maker series, Joy Xtra, Joy and Joy 2. You will need to make the pre-designed cards smaller to cut with a Joy or Joy 2.

Foundation learning

If you're new to making papercrafts with your cutting machine, check out these links to get you started.

They include videos on topics such as: which file to use with your type of cutting machine, how to load the files into your cutting machine's software, how to cut cardstock with your type of cutting machine, how to recolor and modify/customize the cut files and tips for displaying your projects.

The following tutorials are Cricut-specific, but many of the ideas will work similarly with a Silhouette or ScanNCut machine and any cut files that are shared in them are compatible with all types of cutting machine.

Ornate frames and borders video tutorial

Watch the video below to see how to make this project. Keep scrolling for a written tutorial.

Want to share your thoughts on this project? Click here to visit the video on YouTube

PART 1: Predesigned cards

First, we will start with how to make predesigned cards from within the download folder.

Want to design your own? Keep scrolling for the tutorial!

Step 1) Download the cutting file & upload to Design Space

Get the files using the box below.

Purchase the File(s)

This cut file is available as part of the Instant Access Bundle.

Find out more

Or, purchase the designs individually:

Decorative Frame Card

Decorative Border Card

Decorative Elements SVG

Before you upload the SVGs to Design Space, you need to unzip the download folder that they come in.

After unzipping, upload the SVG file(s) into your cutting machine software.

Not sure how to use cut files with your type of machine? The following links lead to videos on how to open cut files in:

The download folder also contains printable PDF versions of the templates for hand cutting.

If you are using Cricut Design Space, start a new project and then click the “Upload” button on the left of the screen.

You can then either click “Browse” to find the file on your computer, or drag-and-drop it.

Select the files in the “Cutting Machine Versions” subfolder that is in the “SVG Files” subfolder.

You can only upload one file at a time.

Press “Upload” on the next screen.

After uploading, the design should be automatically inserted onto your Canvas.

To hide the left sidebar (to give you more space for designing!), click the arrow that’s about half way down the page.

If the design doesn’t get inserted onto your Canvas, it will show under “Uploads” in your “Recently Uploaded Images”. Click on it and then press “Add to Canvas” to put it onto your Project.

Need help uploading SVGs? Get step-by-step instructions here in our detailed help guides for Cricut, Silhouette and ScanNCut.

I have loaded both of the designs onto my project, as well as a gerbera daisy SVG from my shop.

Step 2) Customise the designs and add the score lines

The cards should load in at 7 inches wide and 10 inches tall. If not, adjust them to match those dimensions.

They will make 5×7 inch cards once the base card is folded in half.

Note: If you are using a Cricut Joy or Joy 2 then you’ll need to delete the base card (and hand-cut a sheet of card to size), then change the card front to a maximum of 4.5 inches wide.

Change the colours if desired.

I will be cutting my border card with a purple theme and using a galaxy inspired patterned paper for the background.

I like to use lime green on the screen to remind me which layers are for patterned paper.

If you have a scoring tool for your Cricut then you may want to add score lines to the cards to make them easier to fold.

Click “Shapes” and select a score line.

Size it to 7 inches.

Click the card design and Ungroup the layers to separate them.

Select the score line and the base card and press “Align > Center” to put the score line exactly in the middle.

With both layers still selected, click “Attach”. That tells the Cricut to do the scoring on the base card.

Drag the base card back to the bottom of the layers panel and put back in place.

Repeat these steps for the border card if you’re making both of them.

I changed the colours, added a score line and put my gerbera daisies in the middle and sized accordingly. I also changed some of the colours in the daisy design.

Step 3) Cut out all the pieces

When you’re happy with how the project is looking in Design Space, click “Make” and follow the instructions on-screen to cut out all the pieces.

To change the paper size, go into the dropdowns over on the left side of the screen and choose the paper size that you want to use. You need to change it for every single colour.

To save space on your cardstock, you can move things around by clicking and dragging. Make sure when you’re moving things about that nothing overlaps because otherwise, it won’t cut out properly.

Don’t rotate any of your patterned paper layers, otherwise the pattern may not appear the “correct” way up on your card.

TIP: New to using cardstock with your cutting machine? Check out these machine help guides for Cricut, Silhouette and ScanNCut that go through every step of the process, including tips for getting the best quality cuts from your machine.

Step 4) Glue the layers together

My favourite glues to use on papercraft projects are Bearly Art Glue and Collall All Purpose Glue.

These are great because they don’t “warp” or bend the cardstock like some glues do. You can use as much of it as you want and the card stays perfect – and it dries perfectly clear too!

Bearly Art Glue comes with a tiny nozzle to make it easy to apply glue to small areas of card. The Collall glue doesn’t come with this, so it’s easiest to decant it into needle tip applicator bottles so that you have more control.

The foam squares I’m using are from Dot & Dab, but any will do.

For the frame card, fold the base card in half along the score line, glue the solid coloured 5×7 inch rectangle onto the front of the card, then glue the detailed layer on top.

Put together whatever image you have chosen to go in the middle, then use glue or foam squares to stick it into the middle.

For the border card, fold the base card in half along the score line, then glue the 5×7 inch rectangle onto the front of the card.

Glue the border cutout piece onto its backer rectangle.

Use foam squares to attach the backer rectangle to the middle of the card.

And that’s it!

These cards are wonderfully simple to put together, but look really effective because of all the detailed cutouts.

They take longer to cut out than they do to make!!

PART 2: Design your own ornate frames and borders

Here is how to design your own frames and borders cards within Cricut Design Space, using the design elements SVG included with today’s download.

Step 1) Choose your card size and create a template

You can either dive straight in and start making your own custom designs, or have a practice run by trying to replicate one of the premade designs.

For this tutorial, I am roughly replicating one of the premade designs.

Copying the existing designs is a good way to learn all the tools and features of Design Space, and get comfortable with the methods outlined below, without having to worry about the exact design you are making.

Start by deciding on your size for the design.

Insert four score lines and use them to make a template the size of the design.

Change them to “Basic Cut” in the Operations dropdown so that the lines look solid, not dashed.

The reason for using score lines, not a rectangle shape, is because Design Space makes it difficult to select layers that are placed on top of rectangles. It automatically selects the whole rectangle instead, which makes it hard to design.

Get them in place, select them all and press “Arrange > To Back” to move the score lines to the bottom of the layers panel.

Step 2) Begin the design

Start moving the design elements in place.

You can make copies by pressing the Duplicate button at the top of the layers panel, or by copy-and-pasting.

If you’re replicating one of the premade designs, don’t worry about making it match 100%. There will naturally be some variances, and you can switch things up by changing some of the elements or moving them around.

You only need to build up one side of the design, and the central/middle part.

We want our designs to look neat and symmetrical, so we will copy one side and then flip it around to make the second side. That way, everything will match up.

It is helpful to colour the design elements to make it clear which ones are central elements (that won’t be repeated) and which are the ones that will get copied and flipped to make the other side.

If you’re making a frame design then build up the corners like this:

Duplicate and rotate to make the other side.

Then duplicate and flip for the opposite corner.

Group those elements together, then duplicate and Flip Vertically for the bottom part of the design.

You can then fill in one of the sides, then duplicate and flip to fill the other side.

Step 3) Finalise the design

When you are happy with how your pattern is looking, select all the middle pieces and press Align > Horizontal to neatly arrange them in line with each other.

Group the middle elements together.

Select all the side elements (black in my design) and Group them.

Duplicate that group and press Flip > Flip Horizontal to make a mirror copy.

Roughly put it in place, then select both groups of side elements and press Align > Top to line them up.

Select both side element groups and the middle group and press Align > Horizontal to line them up.

Group everything together and duplicate.

Flip the copy vertically.

I can see now that I have made my border too “long” to fit within my 7 inch template.

You could select both groups and resize them smaller to fit.

Or, delete the duplicated group, Ungroup the original top part and move things around so they take up less space.

You can do the same thing if you have the opposite issue and find that your design doesn’t fill up enough of your guide shape.

Once you’ve made the changes and re-aligned everything, Group it all together, Duplicate and Flip Vertically.

Now my design fits much better.

You can leave a gap between the top and bottom copies of the pattern to add other single elements into the middle (for example, the butterfly that appears in the very middle of the premade design).

Fill in any gaps.

Step 4) Subtract the design elements

When you’re happy with the design, save your project if you haven’t already, then delete all the design elements you have not used.

Insert a rectangle that’s the side of your guide.

Hide the four score lines.

Group all the design elements together, if they aren’t already.

Move the rectangle to underneath the group in the layers panel.

Select the group and the rectangle and press Align > Center.

Duplicate the rectangle and move the copy off to the side.

Select the design elements group and the original rectangle and press Combine > Subtract.

That cuts the design elements out of the rectangle, to make a stencil effect.

You can see the effect by changing the colour of the duplicated rectangle and dragging the subtracted layer on top.

You can then build up your base card using rectangles or other shapes.

PART 3: Bookmarks

You can use your border designs to make pretty cutout bookmarks.

Step 1) Build the border design

Follow the steps from the previous section of the tutorial to get your border design done.

Part 2) Create the bookmark layers

Group the design elements together, then Duplicate the group to make a copy and move the copy over to the side.

Select one of the groups and press Combine > Weld to merge it into one single layer.

Select the welded layer and press Effects > Offset to add a border.

Change the colour of the Offset so it’s easier to see.

Hide the design elements and check if there are any gaps within the Offset layer.

If there are, click the Offset layer, then press Contour.

Click “Hide All Contours” and then “Apply” to fill in the gaps.

Duplicate the Offset layer in place by hovering your mouse over it on the main screen (not in the layers panel), pressing Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac) and left-clicking with the mouse.

That makes a copy of the layer in exactly the same position.

Change the colour of one.

Turn the welded design elements layer back on and drag it to the top of the layers panel.

Select the welded design elements layer and the top Offset layer and press Slice.

That will cut the design elements out of the Offset.

Delete the slice results until you are left with the one to keep, shown on the left below, and the remaining solid offset layer.

Select both and Align > Center.

Part 3) Add a ring to the top

Insert a circle and give it an Offset.

Slice the circle from the Offset to make a ring shape.

Duplicate the ring shape in place, then roughly drag them in place against the bookmark so that the bottom of the rings overlap with the bookmark.

Select everything and press Align > Horizontal to make sure the rings are exactly in the middle.

Weld one ring to the top bookmark layer and the other ring to the bottom bookmark layer.

You’ll end up with two layers like this:

Here’s how it looks cut out. I used two shades of gold card.

Add a tassel or ribbon on the end to finish it off.

PART 4: Shaped cards

Finally, let’s see how to use the frame designs to make shaped edge cards.

Step 1) Build the frame design

Follow the steps from the previous section of the tutorial to get your frame design done.

Step 2) Create the outline

Weld the design elements together into one layer.

Click the frame, then press Effects > Offset.

Choose your Offset width and apply.

Change the colour of the Offset layer, then select it and add another Offset around the edge of the first Offset.

Select all layers and resize to your chosen card size. I’m doing 5×7 inches.

Check for any small cutouts on the Offset layers, and remove them if needed using Contour.

Change the colours to suit your card. I like doing the bottom layer in white.

Step 3) Create the base card

Duplicate the bottom layer and move it over to the side.

Insert a rectangle and drag the size so it’s slightly bigger then the card front.

Change it to a “Guide” layer in the Operations dropdown.

Drag it over the card so that it overlaps the left edge.

We will cut this edge straight on the card to allow us to make a base card that can be folded in half.

Slice the rectangle from the white shape and delete the Slice Results so you are left with something like this:

Duplicate the shape and flip the copied version horizontally.

Line them up so that the straight edges are just overlapping a very slight amount.

Align them both to the top of each other.

Weld both together.

Use Contour to remove the holes in the middle of the base card.

Add a score line and make it the height of the card (7 inches).

Select the base card and score line and press Align > Center.

Click “Attach” to join the two together.

You can then add a printable picture, photo or similar to go in the middle.

Step 4) Cut and stick the card

Glue the picture to the back of the largest offset layer.

Glue this to the front of the card.

It’s best to glue directly onto the front of the base card so that you don’t put any glue on the back of the offset piece that will “overlap” the front to complete the shaped edge.

Add the other layers.

I used foam squares for the next solid layer, then glued the detailed cutout piece on top.

Beautiful ornate frame and border cards

Phew, this turned into a long tutorial!

I hope that you enjoy making these cards, whether you choose to use the premade cards, design your own – or a bit of both!

Put your cards in a custom envelope or 3D presentation box to make them even more special.

Happy crafting,
Sarah x