Medusa and the Tentacle Monster from Papier-Mâché, Silk Clay and Pipe Cleaners

1   Tentacle monster: feed 6-8 pipe cleaners through the mouth of the mask. Bend the end of the pipe cleaner around a plastic bead on the inside of the mask. The plastic bead now works as a ”stop bead”.

2   Pull the pipe cleaners onto the front of the mask and trim to the desired length. Save the offcuts for later.

3   Cover the mask with Silk Clay. Use pipe cleaners (incl. the offcuts) for adding details - for example for eye brows, a high forehead, extra tentacles from the nose.

4   Push two blobs of Silk Clay through the eye sockets of the mask, so that the eyes are protruding onto the front.

5   Tentacles: finish by covering the pipe cleaners with Silk Clay and bend them to your chosen shape. You may put pieces of plastic pockets between the tentacles when drying in order to prevent them sticking to each other.

6   Patinating: Add metallic paint (for example Plus Color gold or A-Color metallic paint). Apply lightly in a circle using dabbing movements, leaving cracks and hollows unpainted. This adds an exciting effect. Leave to dry and varnish at the end.

7   Medusa: the technique on the small skull is more or less the same as the one used for the tentacle monster. Make snake hair from seven cut-off pieces of pipe cleaner and secure each piece onto the skull with a blob of Silk Clay.

8   Eyes and snake hair: Fill the eye sockets with a blob of Silk Clay and add two plastic beads to make it look extra scary. Cover the pipe cleaner with Silk Clay in the same manner as the tentacles. Paint/patinate everything with, for example, metallic paint when dry. You may finish with a coat of varnish.