Cosplay Elf Antlers

Hi there, when you are cosplaying fantasy stuff, it is super cool to make some props on your own :)

Here I made some elf antlers I will use for my own elf cosplay.

1. Aluminium foil

2. Tape

3. Metal wire

4. Paper

5. Glue (for paper maché)

6. Paint + brushes

7. An old hairband

8. Air-dry clay

9. Brown fabric + needle and thread

10. Hot glue

Use aluminium foil to shape some basic antler shape. Insert little pieces of wire at the places where little side 'branches' need to come. Wrap these metal wires also with aluminium foil and tape it to the rest of the base.

Cover the whole thing afterwards with another layer of tape to make it one solid antler.

I also added a long metal wire that I pushed through the bottom in order to make them stay put on a headband.

After constructing the base, you can cover the whole antler up with air-dry clay or paper maché (depends on what weight you want them to give them, clay is a lot heavier than paper and clay didn't work out for me to stay put on my head)

In the meantime, you can prepare the headband. As my old headband was very light, I added some more weight with air-dry clay first. I also made a cover from brown fabrics (just cut a strip of fabrics and flip it over en sew. Then turn it inside out, shove over the headband and sew the ends shut by hand)

After the glue/clay is dry you can paint the antlers in the desired colour. The possibilities are endless here! I went for a natural look with multiple layers of paint, which I applied with wet and dry brushes, sponges, my fingertips and tissues. I used a real antler as a reference, but you can even make pink antlers if you want to ;)

If you look closely, antlers have little details at the bottom. I made these ones with hot glue.

I made little glue dots on a piece of baking paper. I then cut those small globe-like shapes in half. Then I glue these halves on the bottom. I also apply another layer of paint on top to blend it in.

The next step is attaching the antlers to the headband. I first glue them to the headband with hot glue and when that's dry I bend the metal wires that I attached earlier around the headband. These two materials will keep the antlers in place during the day when you wear this for cosplay :)

To make the antlers look more elvish and forest-like, I added some fake plants. They look awesome and they also hide the glue and wires from the antlers :)

When everything is glued to the headband, your basic antlers are ready!

I chose to attach some straps of fabric at the bottom so that I can tighten the headband to my hair with bobby pins, just for a little more stability.