So as I was walking around Michaels one day, I got the sudden idea to make a Sakura centerpiece with Totoro. My Neighbor Totoro is a Studio Ghibli film that was drawn by my favorite artist, Hayao Miyazaki. He made well known animated movies like Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and Kiki's Delivery Service. Hayao Miyazaki hand draws all his scenes which makes him even more amazing. He has this amazing ability to draw really whimsical, fantasy nature. Whenever I think of his work, I imagine lots of trees, moss, flowers..etc.
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| These prices aren't completely accurate because they are full-priced. I had a 20% off Michaels coupon (this is around end of June or early July). The employee there told me that they are cleaning the inventory to start stocking up on Fall items so a lot of things were on sale. It might also explain the 20% off my entire bill because usually its just 40% off ONE item. So for future shoppers, end of June/early July is a good time to shop at Michaels! |
- A moss covered vase. $8 This doesn't have to be moss covered. I just felt like it really reminded me of Studio Ghibli (the film studio that made Totoro) so I splurged on this.
- A tall foam cone as the base for my tree $7
- A egg-shaped foam ball for my Totoro $4
- Some Sakura branches (I bought three here but I ended up getting two more because it wasn't full enough) $20
- The Model Magic Clay is from an old Halloween project. The clay inside was separated in three bags so that the rest didn't dry up when I opened the box.
- Rocks to fill in the vase and also to anchor the bottom so that the top doesn't tip the centerpiece over $3 (can pick these up somewhere if you really don't want to spend the money).
- Paint
- Fabric paint (I'll explain later) $4
I carved the cone with a kitchen knife to mimic a tree trunk so it's not perfectly smooth. I was afraid of breaking the foam by making it too thin so I only really carved one side. I felt like if I really needed to make it more "bumpy" I'll just add more clay on top to create it.
I rolled out some Model Magic clay with a rolling pin to smooth it down and wrapped the cone foam. I left it alone for a day to let it harden and noticed that it was starting to crack around the grooves. I tried smoothing it out before it completely hardened but the next day, the crack returned.
My original idea was to carve some bark lines but the clay would crack and peel. So I thought, what was thick and bumpy? Fabric paint!
I could use this stuff to create my bark lines AND fill in that annoying crack that keeps forming.
At first, I was going to make the paint lines really close to give it really subtle texture but it merged together and became a blob. So I started separating it more so that it would have more distinct detailing. I just free-styled it with the bark lines. As long you you're continuous and throw in some loops, it should look pretty good.
The flower branches have both thick and thin wires inside. I had to use a wire cutter to get through the thick one (which is mostly at the bottom of the branches). The top mostly has a thinner wire through it but it's still easier to use a wire cutter since the skin of the branch is pretty thick too.
Then I used regular scissors to cut away at the skin to expose just wire at the end. This helps you stick it into the cone foam easily. It also allows you to rearrange your flowers in case you don't like where the placement is.
If you look again at the picture with the "bark"... I just stuck the flowers in at the top. I left it for a couple of days to see how I felt about it and the more I saw it, the more I hated it. It looked like some sort of Tree Trunk Vase where it all bunched at the top. It didn't look like a natural tree. Luckily, I could pull out the branches and re-arrange them.
I decided the best thing to do is to make more large branches. In order to do that, I staggered the flowers more and added clay to the base where it connected so that it looked like a large branch coming from the trunk. I tried to do this a couple of times until I thought the tree looked more natural.
After I let this dry for about a day, I repeated creating bark lines with the fabric paint. Since the new clay wasn't sticking to the old clay, I used the fabric paint to fill in the gaps inbetween so that I would get a smooth transaction. It also helped serve as glue to make sure the new clay wouldn't move.
It's time to paint! This is 5 flower branches. Honestly, I'd love to put more in but I didn't want to break the bank on just this one centerpiece. That's why I cut the branches into smaller ones and spread them out.
When you paint, just make sure to match the color of the branches so that you don't have to paint that too. You'll really have to experiment with colors here since these branches are kind of greyish brown with some green tint.
Just a pointer, make sure to make plenty of paint. There's nothing more annoying than finally getting that perfect tint and then running out of paint halfway.
As you can see on the left, I started painting my tree. The very obvious bark lines are becoming really subtle like I originally wanted.
And viola! a big Sakura tree!
As I mentioned before, I used the fabric paint to connect the clay to the main frame. If you look at the left side of the tree, I obviously missed a spot so there's a big gap under the branch. The paint is still wet so I'll have to wait until this dries, apply some more fabric paint, wait until THAT dries, mix some new paint and then re-paint. Stinks but that's what I get for not fully checking before I painted.
All in all, I'm very happy with the tree so far.
Technically I could have stopped here but I was really inspired to make this a Totoro scene.
Using an egg foam ball and some more air-dry clay, I made a small Totoro. This is not a good picture of it but hopefully my photographer got some pictures of it at the wedding.
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| It's sitting in a pre-mossed base that I found in Michaels. I filled it with rocks to anchor it down and then topped it with a circular foam base and some more moss that I glued to it.
Not surprisingly, this was my favorite centerpiece. Not only because it was a Sakura tree but I liked how everything turned out... the subtle bark, the natural tree look, the moss...etc.
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