Haunting Victorian Ghost Decoration

I've always loved those realistic Hallowe'en decorations - the kind that scare the wits out of small children. I also love things old-fashioned, so decided I wanted to create a Victorian or Edwardian-era looking ghost to add to our Hallowe'en decorations this year. I had seen some of these chicken wire and cheesecloth ghosts around and decided to create mine in a similar manner, and then added a face by printing onto muslin cloth using Solarfast dye. If you've not tried printing with Solarfast before, you should give it a try - it's quite fun to print a photo onto fabric and watching your image develop in the sun.

I think my ghost turned out to be haunting, but also quite kindly looking too - just the kind of ghost you might not mind meeting and having an interesting conversation with!

FOR THE GHOST BODY & HEAD

• Lots of cheesecloth – I used about 10 yards – 5 of higher quality and 5 cheaper quality
• Teabags for dyeing cheesecloth – 10
• Chicken wire – I bought a roll that had 1 inch cells and was 18 inches x 25 feet
• 20 gauge wire (not totally necessary but handy for securing chicken wire together)
• Heavy thread or fishing wire for hanging
• Needle and thread
• Head form or ball or something head-shaped to wrap chicken wire around

FOR THE GHOST FACE

• Piece of cotton, muslin or linen for face about 12″ x 12″ (prewash and dry fabric to prevent shrinkage after)
• Transparency sheets – 2 (8.5 x 11″ size)
• Solarfast dye - black works best for this tutorial
• 8.5 x 11″ piece of glass for placing over transparency (optional)
• High resolution vintage photo…or your own photo!
• Piece of board or thick cardboard the size of the cotton piece
• Sewing clips or clothes pins

TOOLS

• Wire cutters
• Work gloves or gardening gloves
• Scissors (sharp enough to cut fabric)
• Sponge
• Paintbrush
• Sewing Needle
• Pot or basin for tea-dyeing cheesecloth

1. Start by taking whatever you're using for your head form - I've had this Styrofoam head for years and use it for many things, you can find them at Value Village for about $5. You'll also need wire cutters and some kind of gloves to protect your hands.
2. Unroll the chicken wire and fit your head form inside.
3. Start cutting through the chicken wire 'cells' at the point where the two ends meet, so that it fits snugly around the head.
4. Cut across the chicken wire about 3-4 inches above the top of the head. Carefully remove the head from the form and start folding the overlapping wires to secure. I cut another smaller piece of chicken wire to strengthen the top of the head to be sure it wouldn't come apart when hanging the ghost up - cut a small piece (about 5"x5") and then place this piece at the top of the head, fold edge wires over to secure to the top of the head.

Set the head aside for now while you work on forming the body.

1. For the body, you will need to cut a piece of chicken wire that is 24" x 36". My chicken wire is 24" wide, so I cut a piece that was 36" long. Roll into a tube overlapping the long ends about 3-4 inches. Begin folding the cut wire edges over the wire cells where it meets to secure in place.
2. Now you'll start bending on the wire to form a body shape - push in near the middle for the waist and at the top to form the shoulders.
3. Now take your head shape and place it on the shoulders and start bending the open wires around each other to secure. You can snip open some of the cells to make it easier to wrap the wires around one another. You can also use some of the 20 gauge wire if you have it to help secure the chicken wire together.

1. To make two arms: cut two pieces of chickenwire that are 12 inches by 26 inches. Roll each into a long tube and overlap edges about 3 inches at one end and 1 inch at the other end - one end will end up wider (the shoulder) and the other narrower (the hand end).
2. At the hand end, pinch wires together to make a hand shape. Pinch in near middle to make an elbow.
3. At the shoulder end of the arm, snip open some of the chicken wire cells and fold outwards.
4. Attach the arm to the body by placing the arm at one side near the shoulder area and folding the open wires over the cells on the body shape. Then bend the arm towards the front of the body.
5. Attach the other arm in the same way as the first and then bend the arms and hands downward to make them look a little more ghostly.

To create the face I used a method of printing on cloth using Solarfast dye. Don't forget to prewash your fabric to prevent it shrinking after you make your print - I forgot to prewash and my print turned out a little smaller than I hoped and the face was too small for the ghost body I had made. If you would like a 'life sized' ghost - try to print your image as large as you can to fit an 8.5" x 11" transparency.

Before beginning: have your prewashed piece of 12 inch x 12 inch cotton (muslin works well) or linen ready to go.

1. You will need a sunny or bright-ish day to do this printing since the dye develops under UV light. Overcast is okay too but the image will take longer to develop. Just make sure there's no rain forecast!
2. Start by taking an image that will print to about the size of an 8.5 x 11" piece of paper and turning it into a negative. Solarfast has a handy negative generator for making negatives.
3. Print out your negative image on a sheet of transparency. If all looks good, print out a second transparency negative (you'll need two to make sure it's dark enough). There is more information about printing transparencies at the Jacquard Solarfast website.
4. Secure your two negatives together using a tiny bit of tape, making sure they are matched up exactly. Take your piece of cotton and mark on there where the corners of the negative are, this will help you see where you need to apply the Solarfast dye.
5. Take your bottle of Solarfast and give it a good shake. Place your piece of cotton onto an old board or piece of cardboard. You can secure it with a little masking tape if needed.
6. Pour a little of the dye into a small dish or cup. Apply the dye using a paintbrush or sponge all over the area where you marked off on your cotton. You want it covered completely but you don't want it to be too wet. Press with a rag, paper towel, or sponge to soak up any excess.
7. Now place your transparency negative on top of the dye and then cover over with a piece of glass. If you don't have glass, that's okay, just make sure not to print on a very windy day or your negative might fly away! You could also secure the negative with a tiny bit of tape at the edges.
8. Time to take your photo printing bundle outside! I was printing with black dye on a pretty sunny day in October so I left it out in the sun for 30 minutes. Here is an exposure chart from Solarfast which lists the various times needed for different ink colours. The photo above shows what it looked like after 30 minutes - you can see the developed ink around the edges of the transparency.
9. When the developing time is up, leave your negative in place until you get your print inside and away from UV light as it will keep developing and will make the parts you want to keep light develop darker.
10. After removing the negative you will now need to wash out the Solarfast dye. I hand wash mine in hot water with regular detergent. You can also rinse out the dye in the sink and then throw your print in with the rest of a regular laundry load - I've never had the Solarfast do anything detrimental to my laundry, but you might not want to put it in with anything you don't want damaged, just in case!

It's important to make sure the excess dye is washed out or else your print will continue to develop and you will end up with the lighter areas turning darker and your print will have less contrast.

Once your print is all washed and dried, it's ready to attach to your ghost's head.

1. Start by placing the fabric on the chickenwire head and positioning it where it looks about right.
2. Next, use sewing clips or clothes pins to hold the cloth in place around the edges.
3. Using a needle and thread, make a few stitches at the edge of the cloth and then catch the chicken wire underneath to secure. Do this at a few points all around the head. I did a couple at the top and 2-3 around the sides. You can leave the bottom un-sewn as this will be covered by the cheesecloth.

1. Start by 'tea-dyeing' all of your cheesecloth in 2-3 litres of boiling water with about 10 orange pekoe teabags. Leave in the tea about 1/2 an hour, rinse with cool water and hang to dry. Some cheese cloth is already a natural beige colour, so you can skip this step if you're happy with the colour of your cheesecloth. Some of mine left as-is, the rest was very white so I tea-dyed it.
2. Once dry, take some of your cheesecloth and rip or cut a few strips. These are handy for tying the cheesecloth 'clothing' to the body.
3. Cut a length of the higher quality cheesecloth for the first layer of clothing. You need a piece that will drape down both sides and extends a bit longer than the chicken wire body. Cut a hole about 7 inches in length in the middle centre of the cheese cloth . Fit this over the head. You can make some cuts and rips along the bottom edge of the fabric to make it look tattered.
4. At the underarms, roughly sew the fabric together down the length of the 'gown'. You can use pretty big stitches as it doesn't have to look pretty, just needs to hold together!
5. Using the higher quality cheese cloth again, cut two pieces of fabric to cover around the arms and hangs a few inches over the hands. Using the strips you cut, tie on the 'sleeves' at the elbow and wrist area.

1. Cut a length of plain cotton, cheesecloth or muslin that is big enough to cover over the sides, top and back of the head in a sort of bonnet shape. The piece I used was about 20" x 22". I sewed one edge to make a sort of front for the bonnet with a finished edge, placing the sewn edge at the front, around the face. Sew a few stitches to secure the bonnet to the face fabric.
2. You can just tuck some of the 'bonnet' fabric into the cells of the chicken wire at the back, this seems to secure it well enough.
3. You can also use some of the cheesecloth strips you cut to tie around the neck to secure the bonnet better. Or sew a few more stitches at the neck area to secure.

Continue layering on sheets of cheesecloth until you're happy with the look of the ghost's gown. I used layers of the thicker cheesecloth for the base layers and then layered the thinner cheesecloth over top. I draped some of the thinner cheesecloth over the head and face to create a veiled look. The thinner cheesecloth is easily pulled apart to make it more tattered looking - I did this a bit in a few spots and pulled some threads off the edges too.

The last thing to do is to add a string for hanging! I used some thick nylon shoe-making thread, but you could use anything that has a good amount of strength. Using a needle threaded with your strong thread, go into the fabric on the top of the head and go under some of the chicken wire and back up. Do this a couple times so you have a few loops to hang your ghost from, then knot at the top.

If you have no place to hang it up, you could also try using an old broom handle or something similar to stick in the ground and then place the ghost on top.

Your Haunting Victorian Ghost is finished! Hang it up outside, add a strategically placed flashlight behind or underneath for some illumination if you'd like, and you're all ready to frighten some little children...perhaps a few adults too!