My Disney's Haunted Mansion Inspired Wreath!

Squeaking in juuust before Halloween to show off my last crafty creation of the month:

A Haunted Mansion inspired door wreath!

(Yep, my front door is HM purple. I painted it last year around Halloween, so it seemed only fitting to finally make a wreath to match!)

Appropriately enough, this thing was a nightmare to photograph, but I did my best. I think you can see everything Ok, but I do wish the two lighted elements showed better; they're really much brighter in person!

The first light is in the coffin:

The green shining through the cracks looks super cool at night.

It was inspired by this coffin in the Mansion's conservatory:

 via

And the second lit element is little Leota's head - or more specifically, her eyes:

John and I discovered that if you cram a LED inside a porcelain doll's head, the eyes glow. Nifty, huh? (Now imagine all your dolls with red glowing eyes... that only turn on... AT NIGHT. MWUAH-HA-HAA!)

Here's how the wreath looks during the day:

A bit of a glare on the Welcome sign, but otherwise still pretty fun in the light!

I painted the coffin & clock green as an homage to the HM cast costumes:

via

 The wreath materials were quite cheap, but since almost everything had to be made from scratch, it was pretty labor-intensive. Keep reading if you'd like a quick break down & explanation for of all the parts!

Wreath: An old grape vine wreath, spray-painted black. The lower half is covered with "spooky cloth" - a shreddy fabric from the Dollar Tree that cost - you guessed it! - a dollar.

Crows: $1 each at the Dollar Tree, though I replaced the eyes with red crystals.

Leota: One porcelain doll head, painted all spooky-like, fit inside a clear plastic Christmas ornament. To do this, cut the back third off the ornament with a craft blade, so you can fit the head in through the back:

Testing the fit.

It was a tight squeeze - wish I could have found a larger ornament! - so I had to chop off a lot of hair. The doll I used had bangs, so I removed the wig and turned it around. And it doesn't really show, but after this I also sprayed the hair with watered down white & teal craft paint.

To attach the head to the wreath, wrap a thick wire around the neck stump (there should be a recess there already, where the body attached), and then poke the wire ends straight down into the wreath.

Coffin: Plain wooden coffin ($2.99 from JoAnn's), painted, with a plastic skeleton arm & hand glued inside to hold it open. The little wreath is a sprig from an Autumn flower arrangement, twisted into a circle.

 

Note the authentic cat's tail. :) Thanks, Lily.

The green LED is held inside the coffin lid with Velcro, and to attach the coffin to the wreath, we drilled two holes in the back side & threaded a wire through.

Demon Clock: Here's the inspiration clock in Disneyland's Haunted Mansion:

The clock is either gray or wood-toned, depending on which Mansion you visit, but I decided to make mine green to fit the wreath's color scheme.

John carved the clock face from pink insulation foam (you can buy big sheets of it at Home Depot or Lowe's for cheap). Just print out the face, glue it on the foam, and carve through the paper. The foam doesn't carve well for little things like this - really rough & snaggy -  but after I painted it, you'd never know!

 

I also added the tail, cut from thin craft foam. Then we used hot glue to attach a long wire to the back.

Signage: Whipped up in Photoshop (you can download the Haunted Mansion font for free here), printed on gloss paper, and glued to black craft foam for stability. The Welcome sign is attached with wire, and the "Foolish Mortals" chains are attached with hot glue.

Watching eyes: Cut from white craft foam, using this photo as a reference:

Then attached to the wreath cloth with Glue Dots.

Bats: A last-minute addition, since I just got my HM bat ice cube tray in the mail and was desperate to try it out with some casting resin! Here's the painting progression:

After spraying the resin gold (which looks gorgeous on its own), I brushed on a heavy coat of blackish green craft paint, and then quickly wiped it off again. The result is pretty close to the real ride stanchions!

via

Needless to say, I'll be playing with these resin castings more in the future; I cannot WAIT to make some jewelry with them!

So I think that covers everything on the wreath, but feel free to ask questions in the comments!

And since this is my last Halloween craft, I hope you guys have a spook-tacular Halloween this weekend!

*****

Come see ALL of my craft projects on one page, right here!