Comments on: Paper Mache Horse, Day 6

By: Jonni

Jonni — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 19:06:00 +0000

Katie, the instructions and pattern are included in the horse series. Start at the beginning, with this post. Don’t use the plasterboard like I did, because that was an experiment that didn’t work very well. Cardboard would work much better.

You can find a really detailed version of another horse in my book.

By: Katie

Katie — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 18:28:29 +0000

Hello, this is amazing! I am doing the same thing for a school project and i was wondering if you could tell me to make the frame of his body? please email me at [email address removed] as soon as possible because i said, this is for school and i need to get the information like now lol. thank you and again, this is AMAZING!!

By: Jonni

Jonni — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:46:23 +0000

Hi Carol. I've never done anything that big, or anything that needs to hold up several kids at once. I can offer suggestions, but please don't take this as the opinion of an expert. I'm clearly not. This is what I would do: I'd find a good carpenter who could build a horse out of strong plywood. I would make the "bones" of the horse out of this material, and connect the legs and body together with strong bolts. No work on the external paper mache skin should be done until the internal plywood armature has been proven to be strong enough to hold wiggly kids. You might even want to call in an engineer, just to make sure it's safe before you proceed. You can get an idea of what this type of armature would look like before it's skinned by scrolling to the bottom of my jackrabbit post, but you would have to add bolts going all the way through from one leg to another, through the blocking and the body, so the weight of the children wouldn't cause the armature to come apart. The pole would have to be attached to the armature, and some kind of metal support would have to be attached to the pole and extend under the horse's tummy. I'm not an engineer, but it seems like the pole and it's connection to the horse would be the area most likely to give way under the weight of moving children. Once you have the plywood armature strong enough, you can fill out the muscles and create a hard skin using the techniques found in the tutorials on this site. Since kicking is natural while riding a horse, you would have to put on many layers of paper and paste - up to 1/2 thick or more. As I said, please get the advice of a competent engineer or carpenter. My ideas often sound good, but need plenty of tweaking in real life.

By: Carol

Carol — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 03:10:08 +0000

Oh the horse needs to be life size.

By: Carol Pastore

Carol Pastore — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 03:07:09 +0000

Hello

We are a small therapeutic riding program. One of our local high school groups would like to make a carousel horse for our program to use for special events and parades, etc. Do you have any info you can share on how to get started? We would like to have the horse be sturdy enough to hold 1-2 small children. We would like to be able to have the pole be fixed to a sturdy floor. Any information you can offer would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much . . .

By: Jonni

Jonni — Sun, 31 May 2009 02:38:32 +0000

Hi Doreen. Several people have emailed me with that question and I always say “I don’t think so.” I haven’t tried it myself, but water can find it’s way into even a microscopic hole in a painted coating. Once it’s in, the sculpture would begin to rot. I suggest that you make your sculpture out of concrete instead.

However, that’s only an opinion. If there’s anyone out there who knows of a way to completely waterproof a paper mache sculpture, I’d sure like to know about it, too. I would love to put a life-sized ostrich out in my front yard!

By: Doreen

Doreen — Sun, 31 May 2009 01:52:30 +0000

Is it possible to make paper mache weather proof? I am doing a smurf about 2-3′ tall and I would like to put him in my garden but I am afraid all my work would be ruined. please let me know if you have any ideas.