Thursday, July 21, 2011

$3 Thursday – My so called Mannequin

I’ve been drooling over vintage and not so vintage mannequins for a while now. 

I’ve seen directions on how to make your own mannequin and even attempted to make my own with newspapers and tape.  Let’s just say I gave up on that attempt.  It was a major fail before it was even half done.

But a few months ago I came across this at my local goodwill.

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I couldn’t pass it up and to make it even better it was half off the day I found them.

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So for $2.49 I had the base for my mannequin.

Hmm, maybe if I had a good base I could make my own mannequin of sorts.  It won’t be like the vintage ones on cast iron stands but it would be mine.

I wasn’t sure how I wanted to cover the clear plastic to make Missy   (Yes, I named my mannequin Missy.) more like the vintage image I had in mind.  I thought of book pages, sheet music, pattern pieces, canvas or kraft paper might do the trick.

 

I came across some free canvas and lightweight cotton material at the local SCRAPS shop and decided to use it to cover the plastic form I had.

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Initially I didn’t think about the back side but when I realized one of the pieces would cover the back in one piece I decided to start with covering the backside.

I started with the largest cotton material and set Missy on top.  Then I got out some cheap school glue and watered it down to thin it out and make a decoupage glue.  Now is a great time to stock up on glue for your own decoupage projects with all the back to school sales going on right now.

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I roughly trimmed the fabric to fit around the plastic form and cut a few slits around it to help make it a bit easier to form around the curves.

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I then just slopped on glue and tried to smooth down the material the best that I could.

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A word to the wise…. don’t use your best scissors for this if unless you don’t mind a bit of glue to clean up afterwards.

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So once I had the front covered it was time to let Missy dry.

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Here is the back side.

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I know Missy still needs a bit of work but I’m not sure what the finished results will be quite yet.   Here is how she is, still hanging out drying.

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It is fairly humid lately so even with 12+ hours of drying it is still not dry all the way.

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Missy is not finished yet but for now, I’m happy with my $3 mannequin. 

Well, happy enough for now. 

 

Supplies:

Plastic Mannequin     $2.49

Glue                 $.40

Fabric             free

Total cost:   $2.89

My own so called mannequin….. priceless

 

June

I usually link to these fabulous parties:

1 comment:

  1. Love the mannequin! What a great deal. Thank you for the sweet comment on my blog. Just started following yours & look forward to seeing more of your deals & projects!

    ReplyDelete

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