How to make a perler bead ornament from a photo

A picture from your phone, one pegboard and an evening: fused beads are the quickest handmade ornament there is. The thing to settle first is the size, because the board decides it, not you.

Written by the developer of Gingham · Published 30 September 2026

Try it on your photo Gingham shows the whole pattern before you pay anything.

How big is a bead ornament on one pegboard?

Bead size decides everything else. The usual “midi” bead is 5 mm, and retail listings for the interlocking large square pegboard put it at 29 × 29 pegs and about 5.7 inches a side; snap four together and you get a board that takes 3,364 beads at roughly 11.4 inches. Those are the sizes a photo pattern has to live in:

Those three are exactly the fuse bead sizes Gingham offers, labelled “1 pegboard”, “2×2 boards” and “3×3 boards”, and it prints the size in inches next to the bead count. Beads fuse slightly smaller than their nominal 5 mm, so treat the inches as close rather than exact.

So the first honest thing to say about this project: a photo ornament is bigger than the 3-inch bauble most people picture. One board is nearer a coaster than a bauble, and it is a solid slab of fused plastic, so hang it low on a branch near the trunk, or skip the tree and hang it in a window where the light comes through. If you specifically want the small, light, 3-inch thing, that size belongs to thread rather than beads — a cross stitch Christmas ornament from a photo is 42 × 42 stitches on 14-count and finishes at exactly 3 inches.

Shaped boards — circles, stars, hearts — are sold for beadwork, and they are lovely for stock designs. They are no help here: a pattern made from a photo fills a rectangle, every cell included, so it needs the square board.

Which photos survive 29 × 29 beads?

841 beads sounds like a lot until you divide it up. A subject that fills the frame gets about 29 beads across — fewer than a face needs for eyes alone. Pictures that convert well have one subject cropped tight, a shape that still reads when you squint at the phone, large areas of flat colour, and a background that contrasts with the subject. Pets, a single tree, a house, a snowflake, a monogram, a game sprite or a logo all work at this size.

What does not: group photos, busy backgrounds, thin detail like string lights or bare branches, and human faces. Crop before you convert, never after — a grid spent on empty background is detail you cannot get back. If your subject really needs the detail, step up to 2 × 2 boards and accept that you are making a wall piece. The same trade-off, in more depth, is in how to make a perler bead pattern from a photo and how to turn a photo into a pattern.

How many beads and how many colours?

The bead total is fixed by the board: 841 for one large square, background and all. The colour count is yours to choose, and it is where ornaments go wrong.

• Start low. Gingham converts a bead pattern to 12 colours by default and allows up to 40. Twelve is plenty at 29 × 29, and 8–15 covers most subjects; a count near the cap only earns its keep on the larger boards.
• Every colour is a purchase. Beads are sold by colour, so a 20-colour ornament is a 20-bag shopping list for a piece that uses a handful of some of them.
• Single beads are noise. One bead of a colour surrounded by another is fiddly to place and muddy to look at. Asking for fewer colours is the fix — it is the bead version of confetti in cross stitch.
• Pick one brand and stay with it. Perler, Hama Midi and Artkal S are all 5 mm and fit the same boards, so a pattern matched to one brand’s colours is a key you can actually shop from. Gingham matches to whichever of the three you choose, and counts the beads for every colour so you know what to buy.

Screen colours are approximate, especially skin tones and greys. Check the key against real beads before you order anything.

How do you iron a bead ornament flat?

Craft tutorials differ in the details but agree on the shape of it:

1. Cover the finished board with ironing paper or parchment.
2. Use a dry iron on medium, in slow circles, for about 10–20 seconds. Don’t lean on it: pressing hard melts the beads into a blob instead of leaving the holes visible.
3. Let it cool, peel the paper, lift the piece off the board, then fuse the back the same way so both faces look finished — an ornament turns on the tree.
4. While it is still warm, press it under a heavy book until cold, or it will curl.

An adult should do the ironing. Brand instructions vary a little, so test on a scrap piece before you fuse the one you care about.

How do you hang a bead ornament?

A photo pattern has no hanging loop built into it, so this is a decision you make after fusing. The published methods come down to four:

• Thread through a bead. Push cord, twine or embroidery floss through the hole of a top-centre bead and knot it. Nothing to glue, nothing to buy.
• A jump ring through that same top bead, with ribbon or cord tied through the ring.
• A wire ornament hook hooked straight through a bead hole — the fastest option of the four.
• A loop glued to the back. Hot-glue a loop of baker’s twine or ribbon behind the top edge, which keeps the front of the design clean.

Whichever you choose, plan the top row when you crop. A pale background bead at top centre disappears behind the knot; a dark eye or an outline bead there does not.

Will it be finished in time for the tree?

Comfortably. As of 30 September 2026 Christmas Day is 86 days off, and a single board is the kind of project that fits in an evening or two, with the ironing measured in minutes — which is why bead ornaments are the sensible answer when you need eight presents rather than one. Several tiles designed from one palette draw on the same bags of beads, and they post flat. The projects that need planning now are the stitched ones: how long cross stitch takes has the hours, and a pillow started in late September is next year’s present.

Your photo, one pegboard

Gingham turns a photo from your phone into a fuse bead pattern on 1, 2×2 or 3×3 pegboards, matched to Perler, Hama or Artkal colors — up to 40 of them — with a bead count for every color and a total to buy. The conversion happens on your phone. Build and inspect the whole pattern free; saving it and exporting the chart as a PDF or PNG is Gingham Pro, a weekly or annual subscription with a 3-day free trial.