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Costume Design & Construction

Foam and Airball Mask Project made on a Plastic Base (5D+5C)

For this project you will need 

• a plastic base mask from a craft store

• cheesecloth or tobacco cloth 

• craft scissors

• acrylic glaze, flexible glue or white glue

• Hot Glue Gun

• bits of foam, cardboard, and/or poster board as the design requires

• Non-toxic paints, decorative do-dads like feathers, fake flowers or rhinestones, as the design requires.

Step 1:  Make a sketch of the design you wish to produce, including a plan for the 3-D bits.

Complete Book of Sewing

The Costume Designer's Handbook : A Complete Guide for Amateur and Professional Costume Designers

The Costume Technician's Handbook : A Complete Guide for Amateur and Professional Costume Technicians

 

Stage Costume Step-By-Step : The Complete Guide to Designing and Making Stage Costumes for All Major Drama Periods and Genres

The Magic Garment : Principles of Costume Design

Costume Construction

Masking and Madness: Mardi Gras in New Orleans

The Prop Builder's Molding & Casting Handbook

 

The Prop Builder's Mask-Making Handbook

Mask Making: Get Started in a New Craft with Easy-To-Follow Projects for

Beginners

Maskwork Masks of Mexico : Tigers, Devils, and the Dance of Life

 

Maskmaking

MASKS: Faces of Culture

Men, Makeup, and Monsters : Hollywood's Masters of Illusion and Fx Special Make-Up Effects

The Face : A Natural History

 

After a Fashion: How to Reproduce, Restore, and Wear Vintage Styles

Step 3: Cut and shape pieces of foam, cardboard or poster board to make the 3-D parts of the mask.  Hot gle them to the mask on a "cool" setting.   

Step 4: Take your tobacco cloth or cheesecloth and lay it over the whole of the mask, stretching and tucking it around the 3-D parts.  Tack it loosely in place in a few spots with hot glue so it won't shift.

Tuck the outer edges under the mask and tack them with hot glue, being careful not to pull them too tight.  You want to keep the wrinkled texture, and a little extra material to be tucked in the crevasses at the next step.    Trim off the excess.  

Step 5: Using the acrylic glaze or glue, dampen the cloth thoroughly and use a paint brush to tuck the cloth into the crevasses.  Dry.       

Paint the surface of the mask with the colors and design you want, and allow the mask to dry again.

Step 6: Finally you can use hot glue to affix any other decorative elements like feathers, ribbons, rhinestones, artificial leaves, etcetera. You can use Mask Making Instructions  or one of the sets of additional  instructions below, to get ideas about how to further build/decorate your mask.  Try to get the mask to look as much like your intended design as possible.  Any material is ok as long as it works. 

When it is finished, photograph the mask as jpeg files and post them to your File folder at the class eGroup.  Post a message to the group letting everyone know you have posted these pictures so you can get feedback.

If this project really excited you, here are more online tips to help you make other types of masks that may interest you after doing this project:

• Milliners way of Mask Making with Buckram 
• 68 Ways to make Really Big Puppets
• Masking with Felt
• Making Faces With Cardboard and Mache

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