Krystal Cotriss is a puzzle Instagrammer (@krystalcotriss), puzzle brand ambassador/affiliate and graphic designer who is very involved in the puzzle community. She attends puzzle events, hosts puzzle alongs and shares her love and knowledge of puzzles through her Instagram account and website.
I (Joyce) chatted with Krystal about speed puzzling and preparing for the upcoming 2026 USA Jigsaw Nationals competition, hosting the Meta Puzzle Along (January 29 - February 16, 2026), collaborating with puzzle brands, and more. Read on to get to know Krystal!
Or scroll to the bottom to watch the full video interview on our YouTube channel.
(Interview has been edited for length and clarity.)
No, I went to Winter Carnival which was really fun but with everything that was going on, it was really stressful. I did do some speed puzzling there, some solo practice, but not any Ravensburgers. I was doing Puzzle Twists at Winter Carnival. It's a really fun event, it's just so chill. There's not as much pressure as when you go to Nationals. The artists that they pick for the puzzles, they're always really amazing. It's not a stupid hard image, just fun. I like random-cut puzzles a lot better because I can really see the shape and find a piece really quickly. Can't really do that with a Ravensburger, personally.
I've never made it past qualifying. The first year I went, I had the sushi puzzle. I didn't like it at all. I barely finished it within the time. Then this past year, I had that garden puzzle, and it was just a disaster. I did not finish. So I'm hoping this year I get a little bit better luck and maybe there's a chance I can qualify. I would love to just finish the puzzle within the time.
Fun illustrations. The best example I can give is the Mini Tourney speed puzzling event Moana puzzle. That style of artwork, illustration style, where there's just blocks of color or patterns, when there's good sections you can pull out, that's kind of my style. "Jazzy" from a few years ago, I really like and I did the other one that's by that same artist. Lots of things you can work with, lots of textures, lots of different sections.
I guess a couple years now. Maybe this year's going on 3 years? My first ever speed puzzle was a speedpuzzling.com event. I was recording it at night, it was live, and it was a New York Puzzle Company. It was this watercolor horses puzzle. I gave it away because it was not a good first-time speed puzzler run. It took me over 2 hours to do it. It was so rough. But I haven't had a time that's been over 2 hours since then.
I've been really active puzzling probably since 2018, 2019. I've been following Karen Puzzles since she started as a graphic designer YouTuber. There's probably very few people that watched her first channels. I used to watch her DIY channels and then naturally followed her into her puzzling YouTube, so I blame her. Because I started buying lots of eeBoos. I have a whole stack of them I still haven't done. That's where I started because there was a toy shop near me that during COVID, I would just buy them because there wasn't much else to do. I had just moved to Baltimore and there was nothing to do. I did puzzles when I was a kid, but not as many as I do currently.
I try to do it every day just because there's so much in my house. I think there's 800 or 900 puzzles in my house. I'm an ambassador and affiliate for several puzzle companies, so they always send you puzzles and I have a hard time saying no. I try to swap some, sell some that I can make a little money back and put that into future puzzles. I think I'm actually gonna start some traveling puzzles just to get a few out of my house. I did over 300 last year so that's almost one a day. I usually start one in the evening and work on it throughout the week or I do most of my puzzling on the weekend because that's when I'm off and have the most time.
The best way I can describe a meta puzzle... a jigsaw puzzle that might have a puzzle piece in it, maybe it's the word puzzle, maybe it's a puzzle box, any type of
puzzle that you could see in an image. It's essentially a puzzle within a puzzle.
For the puzzle along, you basically complete a meta puzzle and post a picture of it on Instagram. This year it’s January 29, 2026 - International Puzzle Day - through February 16, 2026.
There’s a minimum piece count of 99 pieces. If you, for some reason, have a meta puzzle that’s only 50 pieces or something, all you have to do is just do another puzzle to meet that minimum piece count and submit them both together to qualify as one entry.
There's a secret object you need to include in your photos, in an Instagram story or a post.
Custom puzzles work too because puzzlers will sometimes make custom puzzles that include something about puzzles since they love them so much. There’s a lot of those out there. Like, SpeedPuzzling.com has done several. One is called Masterpieces and there’s Van Gogh paintings and things like that in an illustrative style but with puzzle pieces throughout.
You might already have some in your collection. I like hosting puzzle-alongs so you can do your puzzles and not buy new ones. I don't want you to buy more puzzles, that's not what this is about. It’s more or less finding what puzzles you might have, so it's just a fun way to get them out of your way.
The puzzle along ends on February 16 in your time zone. I have people submitting from Germany, Austria, all different time zones. I’m probably over 200 entries as of February 6. Last year we probably had over 400 entries total. I take time to track those entries in a spreadsheet so I can see data after - what puzzle was the most popular, how many entries we got, most popular brands… I don't technically have to do all that, I just like data. I'm a big nerd.
I’ve been doing design full-time for probably 7 years or so. I started graphic design when I was in high school and my school had a printing class. I was unique in that perspective because a lot of graphic designers don't have a lot of print knowledge. I've been through several company rebrands so I have a lot of experience with that.
I call myself a design unicorn because I do a lot of different things, like, I can edit your website, I can make a social media post, I can make you a brand guide. I've really done it all, because I've worked for mostly in-house companies with small teams, so there's always a lot of work to be done. I've also had a lot of marketing experience - that's something you don't always get, so I've been very fortunate with that.
But yeah, I love it. One day, it definitely would be goals to work for a puzzle company, or be a designer for a puzzle company. I’d love to design a puzzle if I could, maybe one day.
So with Le Puzz, I designed a bunch of their GIFs on Instagram. I did that a few years back. It was really fun. That was one of my favorite projects. I've worked with the USA Jigsaw Puzzle Association. I've volunteered with them to make some graphics here and there. I helped with Puzzle Parley the last time they had that. I'm always open to work with anyone if they ever need design help.
I would just say, keep up with me and keep posted because there's so much coming. I plan to do giveaways, traveling puzzles and stuff in the future, so there's lots of opportunities.
I'm attending lots of puzzle-related things this year. I'll be going to Nationals, Puzzle Parley will be in July, there's a DMV speed puzzling event - I have two speed puzzling events in the same weekend coming up in March.
So follow me and see what's happening!