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Christmas Special
Why sculpt giant snow creatures in foam? Coming from Extreme Makeover: Home
Edition, I had to take the makeover to a new level with Trading Spaces. I loved
the movie Groundhog Day, and remembered the scene with Bill Murray carving
the snow angel of Andie McDowell. I wanted to bring some of that magic to a
Christmas special. Eventually, the chainsaw ran out of gas and I switched to an
electric Sawzall. I had a ton of help removing foam to get to the heart of the
sculpture and I owe a huge debt to many people behind the scenes at the show
for helping me out. In the end, I was sculpting pretty quickly to get the final look
of the bear and the seal but the snowball was a huge group effort! Thanks also to
Dekralite for letting me buy the gigantic garlands for the north pole.
There was some reupholstering and pillows done by the magnificent Tara, but that
little denim loveseat didn't make the show. Thank you to Brandon for the cool
idea of creating an ice cream and martini icon for the bar sign. I loved that!
The game table was a fun project. I used a permanent marker to draw directly on
the wood and our traders used a small routing tool to carve the outline and then
painted the images in fun bold colors.
The paper floor was one of my favorite projects for creativity, budget and effect. I
purchased a role of brown paper, gloves and 3 cans of semi gloss polyurethane
(water-based). Leaving a clean edge where the paper meets the wall, I tore all the
sides that would overlap another sheet and prepped all of these paper tiles
ahead of time - essentially mapping out the pieces. Then I rolled polyurethane on
the floor and the back of each sheet before laying them down. I rolled another
coat of poly on top and then overlapped the next tile. Ideally you let the entire
floor dry and then add up to 3 coats for more durability. If you get a scratch or
knick in your floor it is easy to patch with more paper and polyurethane.,
Why sculpt giant snow creatures in foam? Coming from Extreme Makeover: Home
Edition, I had to take the makeover to a new level with Trading Spaces. I loved
the movie Groundhog Day, and remembered the scene with Bill Murray carving
the snow angel of Andie McDowell. I wanted to bring some of that magic to a
Christmas special. Eventually, the chainsaw ran out of gas and I switched to an
electric Sawzall. I had a ton of help removing foam to get to the heart of the
sculpture and I owe a huge debt to many people behind the scenes at the show
for helping me out. In the end, I was sculpting pretty quickly to get the final look
of the bear and the seal but the snowball was a huge group effort! Thanks also to
Dekralite for letting me buy the gigantic garlands for the north pole.
There was some reupholstering and pillows done by the magnificent Tara, but that
little denim loveseat didn't make the show. Thank you to Brandon for the cool
idea of creating an ice cream and martini icon for the bar sign. I loved that!
The game table was a fun project. I used a permanent marker to draw directly on
the wood and our traders used a small routing tool to carve the outline and then
painted the images in fun bold colors.
The paper floor was one of my favorite projects for creativity, budget and effect. I
purchased a role of brown paper, gloves and 3 cans of semi gloss polyurethane
(water-based). Leaving a clean edge where the paper meets the wall, I tore all the
sides that would overlap another sheet and prepped all of these paper tiles
ahead of time - essentially mapping out the pieces. Then I rolled polyurethane on
the floor and the back of each sheet before laying them down. I rolled another
coat of poly on top and then overlapped the next tile. Ideally you let the entire
floor dry and then add up to 3 coats for more durability. If you get a scratch or
knick in your floor it is easy to patch with more paper and polyurethane.,
Nancy Hadley & Trading Spaces
