Sunday, September 12, 2010

Making Funeral Flowers



During a recent trip to a cemetery I noticed how much atmosphere the flowers left for the deceased add to it. Real flowers die and turn brown quickly while artificial arrangements wilt and fade in the sun.

I decided to try and capture a bit of this atmosphere in my own Halloween cemetery. I went to the Dollar Tree store and purchased about 15 bunches of artificial flowers at $1.00 each. [photo] Big Lots provided four $3.00 plastic urns.

Using a heat gun, I blasted the flower arrangements causing them to wilt. Then I lightly spray painted the tops of the blossoms and leaves with a flat light tan color [photo] to try and create a faded look on the colored flowers and a dusty look on the white flowers.

The results are below. The photos really don't do it justice but all-in-all I think it's pretty successful. I still have to weather the urns in the photos below.











A coating of spider web and some interesting lighting and I think these arrangements will add to the creepy atmosphere of my cemetery...or of my casket viewing area. What do you think?

4 comments:

Madame Jen said...

Looks great! I myself bought some flowers last year from the Dollar Tree and faintly brushed over them with some flat black spray paint for flower arrangments on the food tables for my party. Totally wished you lived in my neighborhood, we could be like the Griswold's Christmas Vacation! haaaa our movie it would be the Zombies Halloween Vacation. :P

The Undertaker: said...

Oh wouldn't that be cool! I live on a "dead end" cul-de-sac and I'm single-handedly trying to revive Halloween in my neighborhood. The earlier I start my exterior decorations...the more people around me follow suit!

Madame Jen said...

The neighbors here are more into christmas decor. Not so much into halloween. I've been given church pamphlets for crying out loud. haaa I hope that people get into the spirit more. I'm in a new neighborhood and a lot of children around here. So here's to hoping all our neighbors get in the spirit!

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