What do a children's exhibition craft and a garden figurine have in common? True, the desire to do it quickly, beautifully and inexpensively. After looking at some photos of hand-made plaster crafts, you can make sure that this option meets the voiced requirements.
Advantages of gypsum as a material:
- Lasting
- Inexpensive
- Non-toxic (unlike, for example, alabaster)
- Easy to use
- Available at any hardware store
Indeed, working with gypsum is quite simple and does not require a lot of related materials. All you need is the gypsum itself, water to dilute it, form and paint for decoration.
You can buy a ready-made form or make it from almost any object using silicone. But for simple DIY plaster crafts, molds made of plasticine, plastic dishes or tree leaves are perfect.
How to make plaster mortar
- The easiest way is to dilute gypsum with water in a ratio of 7 to 10.
- An important point: first, water is poured into the container, and only then gypsum powder is added.
- In this way, the ingress of gypsum dust into the respiratory tract is minimized.
- The strength and plasticity of the solution can be varied using PVA glue or slaked lime.
- Before pouring the solution, it is necessary to lubricate the mold in order to easily remove the craft later.
There are many options for lubricants:
- Silicone,
- Wax,
- Stearic.
Also use soapy water or kerosene. Vegetable oil is often sufficient for small crafts.
Plaster for children's creativity
Gypsum makes excellent DIY crafts for kindergarten. At the same time, the direct participation of children will not be superfluous - such work perfectly develops fine motor skills.
Instruct the children to make a simple shape out of plasticine: a heart, a flower, a carrot, a fish, or a leg and a mushroom cap. Fill it with plaster, wait until it hardens and start painting. Gouache and water-based paints are suitable.
It will also be interesting for children to try pouring plaster solution into a rubber glove, shape it (for example, fix it so that a handful is obtained) and, after hardening, get a real sculpture that can be used as a candlestick.
Another interesting way is to apply plaster on a sheet of wood, and after drying, get an exact copy of it.
In addition, figures can be fashioned from a thick solution without using a form - little men, snails, flowers. If some parts turn out to be too thin, they are reinforced with wire.
But you can make not only crafts with children with your own hands from plaster.
Gypsum products for summer cottages
Do-it-yourself plaster crafts for a summer residence is a quick and budget way to decorate the territory.
You can start with simple "mushrooms", making a shape for a leg from a plastic bottle, and for a hat from a deep disposable plate. Cut off the top of the bottle and pour plaster of Paris inside.
To increase stability, the leg can be reinforced by placing a wire in the middle. Fill the hat plate with the solution.
After hardening, carefully cut the plastic, take out the resulting plaster parts, smooth them with sandpaper and paint. For street figures, acrylic paints are a good choice.
It is also quite simple to make street vases using existing pots, buckets and even boxes as forms.
- If you want to diversify the country landscape with animal figures, then gypsum is perfect here too.Make a frame using wire, bottles, canisters, shape the body parts with thick plaster mortar and leave for a couple of days. After the product has dried, you can start decorating.
- In this way, for example, a bird can be made, the basis for the body of which will be a canister, and the wire for the head, neck, wings and tail. In this case, part of the canister can be left inside the product and you can get an original garden planter.
- And with the help of ready-made brick or stone molds, gypsum will turn out to be durable tiles for decorating an interior in the Scandi style.
To increase moisture and wear resistance, the figures are covered with transparent varnish on a polyurethane or silicone base.
Plaster and fabric products
The main ways of making plaster crafts with your own hands have already been described above. But if you use fabric in work, then the possibilities become wider.
- This method is perfect for children's creativity: wrap an inflated balloon with a rope soaked in plaster solution. After drying, pierce the base and pull out its parts. You will get a ball that can be decorated under a Christmas tree decoration, under a fruit or even under a lampshade.
- For a summer cottage and a garden, using fabrics will make excellent vases. To make them, it is enough to turn the bucket upside down, wrap it with wire, creating a frame, and then wrap it with strips of fabric impregnated with gypsum.
There is also a place for original creativity - creative pots. They are made using a large piece of cloth, which, after bathing in plaster, is simply applied to a bucket, basin or stool, without reaching the ends of the floor. After drying, a crystal-like or stalactite-like vase is obtained.
Plaster crafts are really simple, fast, budgetary and fun.
In addition, manual work and creative activity have a positive effect on the nervous system of adults and children.
Photos of plaster crafts
