Meet Heye, the German Brand That Made Puzzles Funny

Hi Premium Puzzlers,

This week we want you to meet Heye, the German original that made puzzling playful. If you have ever picked a puzzle for the sheer joy of the picture, a wall of cartoon animals, a sky full of balloons, a scene packed with tiny jokes to find, there is a good chance it was a Heye.

The story is a good one. Heye began in Germany in 1962, and not as a puzzle maker at all. It started life as a publisher of magazines and calendars. The turn came in 1972, when it signed the Argentine cartoonist Guillermo Mordillo, whose wordless, big-nosed characters were already loved around the world. Two years later the first Heye puzzles appeared, and they looked like nothing else on the shelf.

Those early boxes were triangular, a shape Heye still uses today, and they were filled with humour rather than postcards. Artists like Mordillo and Jean-Jacques Loup turned football matches, zoos and traffic jams into sprawling comic scenes with a joke in every corner. The pieces are thick, the fit is precise, and more than fifty years on Heye is still the brand puzzlers reach for when they want the table to make them smile.

We hold just one or two of each Heye title. When one sells, it is gone, so if a piece calls to you, do not wait. Explore the Heye range.

A few to start with, all 1000 pieces: Funky Zoo: Black Forest ($30.39), Dreaming: Panda Naps ($30.39), Jolly Pets: 9 Lives ($37.99), Inner Mystic: Woodland ($37.99), Tiny Worlds: The Unicorns ($37.99) and Magic Forest: Stags ($37.99).

Puzzle fact of the week

Ever had a piece from one puzzle drop neatly into another and wondered how? You were not imagining it. Most mass-market puzzles are not cut one at a time. They are stamped out with a single steel cutting die, a bit like a giant cookie cutter, and a maker will reuse that same die across dozens of different images.

So two completely different 1000-piece puzzles from the same brand can share the exact same piece shapes, which means they genuinely interlock. Some artists have turned the quirk into an art form, splicing several puzzles into one surreal mash-up. Next time a stray piece fits where it should not, you have simply met the die.

Back by demand: the Dinner With range

When we launched Thames and Hudson's Dinner With series, it sold out in days. It is easy to see why. Each puzzle lays an imaginary dinner table for a great artist, Van Gogh, Monet, Frida Kahlo and more, dressed in the food, colour and detail of their world. Beautiful, a little witty, and a real pleasure to build.

The good news: we have restocked. A few to start with, all 1000 pieces: Dinner with van Gogh ($34.99), Dinner with Monet ($34.99) and Dinner with Frida ($34.99). Shop the Dinner With range.

The Puzzle Journal

There is a data scientist behind this shop, and the Puzzle Journal is where that side of the business comes out to play. Alongside the stories and the history, we are starting to share what the numbers say about this hobby: which brands are on the rise, what the wider puzzle world is buying, and the trends worth watching. Part passion project, part market intelligence, and all for you. Read the Puzzle Journal.

We also post every day on Facebook and Instagram: puzzle news, new arrivals and the occasional debate worth having. Come and join the conversation.

Free shipping on every order over $150, anywhere in Australia. Near Bondi? Free same-day local delivery within 6km, with no minimum.

All the best,
Mike