She's so Steampunk

So, there I was...walking through Joann's scheming on the seasonal crafts that were marked to 70% off and I came to the Halloween section. There were Styrofoam pumpkins, skulls and spiders. Even what I could only assume was an oddly misshapen carcass of some kind. Then I saw it, just sitting by it's self on the bottom shelf. It was a lonely dress form turned on it's side just waiting for me to see it. I figured it had to have been misplaced and discarded in the wrong aisle because how the heck is a dress form any kind of Halloween decoration? Well, from the ones I've seen so far, it's  can be a dang good one when done right! Because the one that I found was the last one that I could find, I will be purchasing my next ones straight from Amazon. (the link below comes with a stand! How fancy!) At the end of this post, I will list all links to the materials that I used. For the homemade products I will list the materials used to make them.

I took her home and let her sit on my table while I pondered what to do. I know I was going to do use old dictionary pages to decoupage around her for a vintage look. And I had some trim from a sweater that was too big that I just knew would fit beautifully around her some how. I got to work.

When the surface was wrapped in paper and lace and left to dry over night, I came back and decided that she was going to be adorned in gears, keys and wings. I started gluing. And gluing some more. Ran out of glue so I used cement (listed below). Eventually, everything was right where it needed to be. Next step....



She kind of looks like a mummy

Steampunk is industrial. It's gears and wheel sets, metal and rust and hardcore at it's best. I previously ran out of my Art Extravagance Rust Paste Effect set and decided to conjure up some of my own. No matter how well I make my own version, it will NEVER compare to the awesomeness of Art Extravagance. (click the link below and try it out yourself!)

I do not have an exact recipe for it because I haven't quite nailed it. All I did was use the brown, sepiaand a mustard yellow acrylic paints, mixed with fine sand. The darker the individual paste, the moresand. For example, the brown paste holds a lot more sand that the 'gold' paste. Stir them all up individually and add a dollop of  white Elmer's glue to each. I believe that when it dries with the acrylic, it causes come crackles in some spots. You could substitute the Elmer's for crackle medium. The Patina Paste is a mixture of FolkArt's Coastal textured paint in Sand Dollar (link below) and Golden High Flow Acrylic in Teal. 



And there's my first dress form and certainly not my last! If you have any questions about my processes and/or suggestions on how I can do something better, please please comment and let me know!

She's So Steampunk is available in my Etsy shop