Dracula's Coffin From Cardboard

Halloween is great, everyone knows that, and the best part about it is the creative energy and inspiration that comes with it. We have a costume party every year and always go all out and have fun creating new decorations for the house or creating costumes in preparation for the party. This year I decided I wanted a mini Dracula's Coffin we could stage on the table as a center for all the snacks that will go around it. I've attached the full size files and a pdf of all the parts I cut mine into for you to be able to create your very own.

Supplies:

I made mine out of cardboard, but you could use cardstock, foamboard, or anything similar.

paint (optional)

glue and tape, you will see how I used both in this.

optional extras to make it your own, I put fabric in mine. You could use anything you want!

Tools:

razor knife and straight edge ( I used this as well as my laser cutter to make it a little quicker)

brushes, the sponge wedge brushes achieved the texture I was going for.

painters tape for an extra set of hands.

marker

hot glue gun

This is longest part of the process. At less it was for me, I had to work with in the boundaries of the pieces of cardboard I had so some of my parts are a little chopped up. If you have larger sheets to work with you may not have a lot of time here but I did start by cutting all the shapes out I need to start putting it together. I used mt laser to do the brunt of the work while I did some small more simple stuff. The corners I added relief cuts in them to help bend a little better and give it a little more support where the side panels meet. And as you can see the tape helped hold those pieces together while I marked the parts out and cut the shapes I needed.

This is where you really start to see the coffin come together and take shape. You see these simple shapes that you put together and start to create something a little more complex and recognizable as a Halloween decoration of a coffin fit for tiny Dracula himself. On to the Gluing! now that the parts that need to go together are together you are going to start running some glue along the edge to put the sides on. I added an extra bead of glue along all the corners on the inside for some extra support. After I got all the sides attached to the base I added those corner pieces to the outside with the relief cut in the centers for the support and to help trim it out for the finish.

You now have a true base of a cool mini coffin ready to be decorated how you see fit. Truly from this point on the sky is the limit decorate it how you see fit, or just ad some of your style or flare to make it your own. You can glue the lid on, leave it loose like I did, or maybe make a hinge on it. From this point on let the creativity flow and your personality or inspiration to it.

This step is really just optional and open for you to make this into something really cool. I started by making these decorative corner covers out of the scrap I had left and then once I had them glued on I gave the whole coffin a good solid coat of black paint, but I left it very slightly spotty and cloudy to ad some depth of texture and color for the paint I added later.

After it was dry I got some red velvet like fabric and cut some panels just a tad smaller then the inside to then stuff with filling and add some padding to the inside. Looking back I with I would have found a way to iron or steam the fabric to make it a little less wrinkled.

Then I got some paint to give it a little more character, detail, and texture. I did not water this paint down I just applied it lightly as needed until I got the saturation or texture I was happy with and I only used the foam wedge brushes this whole time. I was able to get a wood texture with the two browns and an Iron look with the light gray and the black base.

Add it to the decorations how you like it. I set out to make this as a center of the snack table and added some other small decorations and lights around it and maybe I will end up filling it with candy for our party. But you can stage it how you want and admire the hard work and creativity you put into it making it your own. I also think it would be awesome to see how you made yours unique to you. So share it with us! Happy Halloween!