You've designed your own city map, or you've bought a digital design. And then the question arises: what material are you actually going to use? Material is an essential part of a product. The same map cut from birch plywood with a PET felt background or black MDF with an anthracite mirror background looks very different.
We have extensively tested and honestly compared the ten best materials for city maps. Not on paper, but in reality: cutting, engraving, testing road width, looking at the cutting edge, assessing how the end result looks on the wall. In this blog, you'll read what each material does, for whom it works, and when you should or shouldn't choose it.
Always test a material before cutting your entire design
Don't have a design drawing yet? Then also read our QGIS tutorial, in which you'll learn step by step how to convert map data into a cuttable vector file. Do you first want to know what you can all make with a city map? Then our inspiration blog about laser cutting city maps is the best place to start.
What do you look for when choosing a material?
Different road widths tested in plywood
Every material comes with a different appearance and characteristics. With city maps, you have to pay close attention because of the narrow details. A well-considered design takes into account the characteristics of the material. Pay attention to these properties:
Can it be cut in your machine? All materials at Lasersheets are suitable for CO₂ lasers, but not all materials are suitable for diode lasers. The LaserGrade quality mark gives you certainty in this regard. You will also find information on the material page about what wattage is needed to cut through different thicknesses.
Minimum road width. A laser can cut down to the smallest detail, but whether this will be stable and beautiful depends on the material. In the list below, we advise a minimum road width per material. Also, consider the ratio between the road width and material thickness; a 2 mm wide street cut from a 9 mm thick plate usually won't look good.
Post-processing needed? City maps are too fragile to sand. If you don't want to see smoke plumes, use good protective film or a material where this isn't noticeable, like Black MDF.
The 10 best materials for laser-cutting city maps
1. Birch plywood 3 mm: the strongest wood for laser-cutting city maps
Map of Rotterdam cut from 3 mm Birch plywood and PET felt.
|
Minimum road width |
Nice combination |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | PET felt background | CO₂ & diode |
This is our strongest wood, making it most suitable for maps with narrow streets. An absolute bestseller, reliable quality, consistent results. With the right settings, the cutting edge produces little soot.
Birch plywood is made of cross-glued veneer layers, making it equally strong in all directions. Light brown in color, virtually knot-free, with a uniform structure. The cutting edge turns warm brown and produces hardly any soot with good settings.
Line engravings are clearly visible as dark brown lines with fine contrast. Area engravings are warm brown and legible. A minimum road width of 2 mm is achievable; for long, narrow elements, it is better to maintain 2.5 mm. No post-processing is needed; any smoke residue can be removed with 400-grit sandpaper.
Best combination: With a colored PET felt background. Cut the roads from wood and the water features from felt, then you'll have the silhouettes of squares and parks remaining in the felt.
View birch plywood at Lasersheets →
2. Black MDF 3 mm: laser-cut city maps with a graphic effect
Geometric fox laser cut from 6 mm Black MDF
|
Minimum road width |
Nice combination |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Anthracite mirror acrylic | CO₂ & diode |
Black MDF has a sleek graphic effect. It is also often used to cut city skylines for walls. And that's exactly the kind of project where this material comes into its own.
Black MDF is colored throughout: the color is not only on the outside but through the entire material. The cutting edge is black and barely noticeable. This means not much post-processing is needed. You won't notice the soot on the edge much, but be aware that it is there when you touch it. Engravings are subtly visible and can turn slightly lighter than the material, depending on the laser power.
Best combination: anthracite mirror acrylic as a backplate behind Black MDF adds depth and refinement.
View black MDF at Lasersheets →
3. PET felt: laser-cutting city maps with color and acoustics
City map of Rotterdam made from PET felt in forest green, water features are cut out and roads are indicated with a line engraving
|
Minimum road width |
Best application |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 4 mm | Backplate | CO₂ & diode |
My personal favorite as a backplate for wooden maps. It adds texture and color to a design. If you create a street network from plywood and cut the water features from PET felt, you give the city a silhouette.
Made from recycled polyester (70% PET bottles), 9 mm thick and available in many cheerful colors. As a sheet material, PET felt is both strong and lightweight. It absorbs sound, making a PET felt city map also an acoustic wall panel. Line engravings are sharp and clearly visible. Area engravings are not recommended: they melt and become shiny. The recommended minimum road width of 4 mm is due to the thickness of the material.
Tip: Cut out the water features and give streets a line engraving. This way you create a graphically clear map in a cheerful color. Also, this helps you recognize a city faster, think of the canals of Amsterdam.
View PET felt at Lasersheets →
4. Mirror acrylic: add more depth to your laser-cut city map
Lime wood city map with anthracite mirror acrylic backplate
|
Minimum road width |
Best application |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 3 mm | Backplate | CO₂ |
Works very well as a backplate, especially anthracite. Its shadowy hue adds immense depth to a space. We were surprised by it ourselves.
Transparent acrylic sheet with a mirrored coating on the back. Available in silver, gold, pink, and anthracite. UV-resistant and hardly distinguishable from glass. The cutting edge is smooth and shiny. The front and back can be engraved.
We do not recommend this material as the map material itself, but as a backplate. Anthracite is the best color option for this. It gives more depth than silver because it reflects less strongly and has a built-in shadowy hue. Not suitable for cutting with a diode laser.
Best application: a backplate behind any material from this list. By placing it close behind something else, it creates an optical illusion of more space without the mirror function being obvious.
View mirror acrylic at Lasersheets →
Also read: Mirrors you can laser cut →
5. Through-colored MDF: laser-cutting city maps in color
City map from yellow colored MDF with surface engraving and blue colored MDF backplate
|
Minimum road width |
|
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | CO₂ & diode |
Beautiful colors, engraving turns brown, and that combination works surprisingly well. The colors also combine well with each other. Please note that these boards are 5 mm thick.
Color runs throughout the material, available in yellow, green, blue, red, orange, and gray. Homogeneous, without grain. The cutting edge turns brown but retains an undertone of the base color. Engravings produce a retro-like two-color effect. Due to the 5 mm thickness, narrow roads are more fragile than with 3 mm material: if in doubt, maintain 2.5 to 3 mm.
Tip: Leave out the water features and give streets an area engraving. This way you create a graphically clear map in a cheerful color.
View colored MDF at Lasersheets →
6. Veneered MDF: laser-cutting city maps with a luxurious wood look
Geometric fox made from Ash and Walnut veneered MDF
|
Minimum road width |
Nice combination |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Ash and Walnut | CO₂ & diode |
Perfect for city maps that need to look chic and natural. Luxurious appearance of real wood, but reliable cutting results due to the homogeneous MDF core. Line engravings turn out beautifully. Be careful with area engravings: you can burn away the veneer layer too deeply, making the glue layer underneath visible.
MDF core with a thin layer of real wood veneer (approx. 0.6 mm) on both sides. Looks like solid wood, behaves like MDF. This is ideal for laser cutting because it has no knots and is particularly flat.
Available in ash (light, Scandinavian), oak (luxurious), walnut (dark, rich), and mahogany (warm). The cutting edge turns brown and is not noticeable next to the wood. Line engravings are sharp and high-contrast. Area engravings are challenging; you get ugly results if you engrave down to the glue layer.
View veneered MDF at Lasersheets →
7. Linden plywood 3 mm: light and affordable material for laser-cutting city maps
City map constructed from two layers of 3 mm Linden plywood
|
Minimum road width |
Best combination |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Mirror acrylic backplate | CO₂ & diode |
Bestseller because it is light and affordable. Loved because it is very flat.
Linden wood has a uniform surface, a less pronounced grain than birch, and is slightly lighter in color. Because it is also light in weight, Linden wood can be cut with low-wattage laser cutters, with diode lasers starting from 6W.
Because it is lighter, linden plywood is also slightly less strong than birch wood. The cutting edge turns dark brown and does not rub off. The adhesive is specially adjusted for laser cutting, which results in less soot when you cut Linden plywood from Lasersheets.
Often bothered by warped boards? Linden plywood has low internal tension, making it very flat and staying that way. Ideal for laser cutting.
View linden plywood at Lasersheets →
8. White coated MDF: laser-cutting city maps with sharp white contrast
If you engrave the coating, the MDF underneath will appear
|
Minimum road width |
Best application |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Medal stand | CO₂ & diode |
Often used for medal stands. Engravings are sharp, and when the settings are correct, the laser burns precisely through the coating.
White decorative coating on a brown MDF core. When engraved, the laser burns through the white layer: white background with brown map lines. Sharp, clear, and easy to read. No post-processing needed, but engraving depth is crucial: too shallow gives a mottled result, too deep makes the design fragile. Always test first.
Best application: wall maps with graphic elements, medal displays, stands.
Tip: Use protective film to prevent tarnishing of the top coating during engraving.
View white coated MDF at Lasersheets →
9. Museum board and felt board: underrated material for laser cutting city maps
Postcards for moving announcements with engraving, Feltboard on the left and Museum board on the right
|
Minimum kerf width |
Best application |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Postcards | CO₂ & diode |
Museum board and felt board are, in our opinion, often underestimated by laser cutters. That's a shame, because laser cutting cardboard can yield beautiful results. Engravings get a warm color and are super crisp. Laser cutting cardboard deserves more attention!
Museum board is acid-free, chlorine-free and smooth in texture, developed for preserving artworks. Museum board is available in 1 and 2 mm thick, it is strong and non-bendable. It is also used for making architectural models.
Felt board, also known as wood board, has a coarse fiber structure. The color is yellowish and if exposed to sunlight, this material yellows even further. Felt board is available in 1 mm thick, this sheet is slightly more bendable than museum board. Engravings are warm brown and clearly legible. Felt board adds warmth and texture to graphic applications.
View museum board at Lasersheets →
View felt board at Lasersheets →
10. Engraving plate ABS: laser cutting maps for signage
Route map for a museum with line and area engraving in Engraving Plate ABS silver with black core
|
Minimum kerf width |
Best application |
LaserGrade |
|---|---|---|
| 2 mm | Signage | CO₂ & diode |
Not for decorative wall maps. This is the material for functional maps: signage, information plaques. Complete your space with signage in your own corporate style. Silver with a black core is, in our opinion, the most chic and timeless option.
Engraving plate ABS is made up of two contrasting color layers. When engraving, the top layer is removed, revealing the core color. This creates a clear contrast and sharp signage. Engraving plate is available in primary colors red, yellow, blue, green, white, and black. But also in metallic silver, gold, and bronze.
Engraving plate ABS is suitable for laser cutting on CO₂ and diode lasers. Because it is only 1.5 mm thick, you can cut these plates with a 10W diode laser.
Common mistakes when laser cutting city maps (and how to avoid them)
We've tried all sorts of things; sometimes you're surprised by how beautifully something turns out, and sometimes it just doesn't work out as you'd imagined. Learn from our mistakes and watch out for the following things.
Multiple layers of PET felt stacked
Above you see a map made of three layers of PET felt: the streets are beige, the parks are green, and the water features are blue. I thought this would be a beautiful combination of colors and surfaces, but as you can see, stacking PET felt doesn't work.
The openings are too small, causing the top layer to cast too much shadow on the underlying layers. Therefore, use PET felt as the bottom layer.
Making roads too thin
We've discussed this extensively above, but don't make your roads too thin. Even if you manage to cut them, fragile pieces will break off quickly during use. A waste of your design.
Design tip: make main roads two or three times wider than normal roads. This increases the recognizability of your map and also provides a kind of support beams.
Get started
Do you already know what you want to make? Check out the advantage packages and order directly in the materials you need.
We have put together nice combinations of materials in the starter kits, so you can try different options. Is your design completely finished? Then check out the advantage packages for a favorable price.
Have you found your material but don't have a design drawing yet? Then follow our free QGIS tutorial and create a cut-ready file of any city or village in the world step by step. Or get more inspiration first in our blog: laser cutting city maps.
