On this page: Box contents - Artbox website - Identifying Artbox puzzles - Special orders
The Artbox brand is manufactured by the Amada Printing Manufacturing Company; from mid-2005 the marketing operation has been split off as a separate company called Ensky. For historical notes and some more details, see the manufacturers page.
Box contents
In days gone by you opened a jigsaw puzzle box, and inside were just the pieces! But Japanese puzzles come with various extra bits and pieces. The assumption is that you will only do the puzzle once, then glue it together for wall mounting, to impress your friends.
1 Pieces
2 Missing piece postcard (Details on request)
3 Sachet of jigsaw puzzle glue (principal ingredient polyvinyl alcohol - PVA)
4 "Mystery object" (glue spreader)
Doing the puzzle
Ignore the strict instructions to do the edge pieces first: put the bits together in any order you like. If you want to display the puzzle, you can use the glue to stick it together. Spread a sheet of clean but unwanted paper under the completed puzzle, with the puzzle the right way up. (Some people say it's best to do this on a sheet of glass, which the puzzle won't stick to.) Then pour the glue over the front of the puzzle: spread it out carefully with the mystery object, so all the joints get neatly filled with glue. It should dry with a nice glossy finish. It is a good idea to practice on a small puzzle before you try this on a really large one.
Disclaimer: I have very limited experience of gluing puzzles - I usually break them up to do again some day. But I have had some success with trompe l'oeil murals!
Please note: Actual box contents may vary slightly - if you find any major discrepancies, please let us know.
Website
The Artbox website is here: http://www.sky-field.net. The catalog index and latest puzzles list are not easy to use, because there are no thumbnails, and you need to be able to find names in Japanese phonetic order. The following links lead to the puzzle listings which show a topic or artist, with ten puzzles on each page. Use the '0|1|2...' links at the top of each page to see more. Click the thumbnail for a bigger view.
The small numbers in parenthesis show the approximate number of puzzles in each category. (These may be missing or out of date; the Artbox catalog is updated frequently, and categories often come and go.)
Names starting a-i-u-e-o
Airou (Monster Hunter) - Blue Exorcist - Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai - Arakawa Under the Bridge (2) - Inazuma Eleven (5) - InuYasha (2) ("a Feudal Fairy Tale") - IS <Infinite Stratos> - Where's Wally? (4) - Three sisters (4) (TV anime Uchi no san-shimai) - Space Battleship Yamato (1) - Ultraman (15) - Angel Beats (3) - Evangelion (9) - Only Yesterday (1) (Miyazaki animation) - My little sister (3) (Light novel: Ore no Imōto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai)
Names starting ka-ki-ku-ke-ko
Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger (4) - Kaibutsu-kun (Anime and manga character ("Little monster")) - Nausicaä (7) - Reborn! - Capybara - The World God Only Knows - Kamen Rider Series - The Borrower Arrietty (15) (Miyazaki animation) - Karl and the amazing tower - Ponyo on the cliff by the sea (22) (Miyazaki animation) - Gundam - Kireizukin Seikatsu (1) (Lazy Racoon becomes "Kireizukin" - tidy housewife - when mole teacher "mogura sensei" covers her head with a red riding hood) - Gintama ("Silver Soul") - Kutsushitanyanko - Bear school - Kuruneko (Cartoon cat from blog) - Porco Rosso (2) (Miyazaki animation) - Tales of Earthsea (1) (Miyazaki animation) - Ghost in the Shell - Kokurikozaka kara (Miyazaki animation) - Coji-Coji - Dwarfs galary
Names starting sa-shi-su-se-so
Sanrio characters (8) - Sika (Character from Finnish author Julia Vuori) - Jewelpet - Suite PreCure - Studio Ghibli (192) (Shows all of the Miyazaki animations) - Studio Ghibli frames - Sponge Bob - The Smurfs - Saint Seiya (Also known as Knights of the Zodiac) - Sesame Street - Spirited away (5) (Miyazaki animation) - The tragedy of Mr Soft (ice cream) - Anpan-man
Names starting ta-chi-tsu-te-to
Tamagotchi (1) - Little Battlers eXperience (4) - Cheburashka (7) (Чебурашка, Russian animated character) - Chibi Maruko-chan - Chopper - The Prince of Tennis - Laputa, castle in the sky (10) (Miyazaki animation) - Tensou Sentai Goseiger - Durarara!! - A Certain Scientific Railgun - To Aru Hikūshi e no Tsuioku (Memories of a certain pilot) - Toaru Majutsu no Index (Light novel: "A Certain Magical Index") - Togainu no Chi (Visual novel: lit. "Blood of the reprimanded dog") - Hamtaro - My Neighbor Totoro (82) (Miyazaki animation) - Transformers Animated (2) - Toriko - Doraemon - Dragon Quest - Dragon Ball Z Kai - Dragonball Z (11)
Names starting na-ni-nu-ne-no
Naruto - 20th Century Boys - Nintama Rantarō - Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan - The Cat Returns (1) (Studio Ghibli animation)
Names starting ha-hi-fu-he-ho
Howl's moving castle (7) (Miyazaki animation) - Fullmetal Alchemist - Hakuōki - Happy Tree Friends - Hanakappa (Children's educaional anime) - Hanasaku Iroha - Hello Kitty (2) - HeartCatch PreCure! - Bakugan Battle Brawlers New Vestroia - Bakuman - The Powerpuff Girls - Aria the Scarlet Ammo - Hime-chen (2) (Children's anime) - Big Comic Spirits - Piramekino - Fate-stay-night - Fujiko F. Fujio characters (Creator of Doraemon and others) - Fresh Pretty Cure! - Black * Rock Shooter - Bleach - Pom Poko (2) (Miyazaki animation) - BOW (Pictures of cars; possibly 'BOW' is an artist) - Pocket Monsters (36)
Names starting ma-mi-mu-me-mo
The Adventures of Hutch the Honeybee (Anime series) - My Melody - Kiki's Delivery Service (27) (Miyazaki animation) - Puella Magi Madoka Magica - Magical girl Lyrical Nanoha - Bush beans - Mayoi Neko Overrun! ("Stray Cat Overrun!" light novel series ) - List of Mario games by year - Marble Mascot - Got you - Whisper of the Heart (6) (Miyazaki animation ) - Muramatsu Makoto (7) - The Moomins - Moshidora (1) (Full title: What If the Woman Manager of a High School Baseball Team read Drucker's "Management"?) - Princess Mononoke (10) (Miyazaki animation) - Monster Hunter Diary: Poka Poka Airu Village
Names starting ra-ri-ru-re-ro
LOVE character - Little Twin Stars - Rilakkuma (relaxing bear) - Rody
Names starting wa
One Piece (131) (TV animation) - Working!! (5) (Comic manga series)
Miscellaneous
Miscellaneous puzzles - Puzzle frames
Puzzles by category
42 pieces - 70 pieces - 108 pieces (75) - 108 large pieces - 208 pieces (4) - 300 pieces (130) - 300 large pieces (20) - 352 pieces - 500 pieces - 500 large pieces - 950 pieces (panorama) - 1000 pieces (95) - 1000 small pieces - 1000 large pieces (4) - 2000 pieces (2) - 330-piece Art crystal (4) - Illuminated puzzles 150 pieces - 68-piece mini-puzzle (42) - 150-piece mini-puzzle (188) - 150-piece mini-puzzle with tumbler (14) - Puzzle sets (15, 35, 54, 80 pieces) - Miscellaneous (50)
(Updated October 2011)
Identifying Artbox puzzles
The Artbox product codes all start with the piece count, then a hyphen, then a code number: e.g., 1000-29 is a 1000-piece puzzle. Imaginatorium Shop item codes for Artbox all begin with 'N' (for "Ensky", as none of the letters in 'Artbox' was available!) followed by a condensed version, with the first two digits indicating the number of pieces. So the above is N1029, then N03xxx means 300 pieces, N20yyy means 2000 pieces, N95zzz means 950 pieces, and so on.
