from: Bunki Kramer (bkramer@srvusd.k12.ca.us)
Los Cerros Middle School
968 Blemer Road
Danville, CA 94526
art webpage - http://ww2.lcms.srvusd.k12.ca.us/faculty/faculty.html
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Another "covering" idea.......
Years ago my friend and I used to sell appliqued sweatshirts during the
summer at craft fairs. It was just a hobby sorta thing that kind of took off
when stores started ordering them in volume and the fun went out the window.
Anyway....I used to make lifesized "dummies" which were lightweight and very
durable to display the shirts. My partner and I would each wear old T-shirts
and we'd wrap each other in that wide brown wrapping tape you buy that's
pre-gummed. All you had to do was wet it and it would stick. We'd wrap the
wet tape around our shoulders, chest, and hips and let it dry. They dried
REALLY strong if you over wrap a few times. Then we'd cut each other's dried
wrap up the center of the back (including the shirt), remove off the body,
and re-tape the seam. One layer of paper-mache sealed everything hard as a
rock. We had to finally seal the bottom of the casing and add sand in the
bottom so they wouldn't blow away at the fairs because they are so
lightweight. We used these same "dummies" for about 10 years which shows you
how durable they are.
We started selling hand-painted men's boxers too...we won't go there any
further...and my partner did some wraps of her husband's hips which became
our other display dummies. We later had one dummy bronzed so my partner
could have her daughter's bronzed baby shoes and her husband's bronzed hips
sitting on her den shelf.
This way is soooo cheap,easy, cheap, lightweight, and cheap. You could
always cast over with plaster gauze too. Toodles........
