Tag Archives: craft project

Pop’s Top 10: Literary Gowns

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Remember when this dress premiered on the Eras Tour? We do! The custom Vivienne Westwood gown is filled with different handwritten versions of the phrase “I love you, it’s ruining my life,” a lyric from Track 1 of Tay’s 2024 album, The Tortured Poets Department. It inspired us to seek out more artists and designers who took literary fashion to the next level. So today we present Pop’s Top 10 literary gowns!

#1 GONNA BE GOLDEN

Created by Ryan Jude Novelline, the artist stitched together the colorful illustrations from discarded Little Golden Books, and fashioned a bodice from the spines. If you’d like to read an interview about his amazing creation, please follow this link.

#2 BOOK WITCH

From Reddit

Posted on Reddit, the detailing on this dress is off the charts! Plus, the hat! The HAT.

#3 SUPER SEUSS

Created by Rebecca Humes, the Seuss-specific shredded tutu and bouncy book characters on springs is delightfully whimsical!

#4 DISNEY DANCER

Another dress by Rebecca Humes. But this one was created from Disney books and features a skirt composed of thousands of chain links. WOW!

#5 POTTER PROM

Hailey Skoch rustled her way to her Arkansas senior prom in a dress made from multiple volumes of Harry Potter books! You can read more about her process here.

#6 FANTASTIC FAIRY

Winner of cutest, most adorable wings and folded tutu is this phenomenal book fairy!

#7 VOLUMINOUS VOLUMES

This distinct dress with a colonial flare was created by White Knight Cosplay. And just look at that teacup broach!

#8 FAIRY TALE FASHIONISTA

A stack of unwanted volumes transformed into a fairy tale worthy dress by Helen Hobden, who also entered it in a contest judged by Maisie Williams! Read more about her adventure here.

#9 BOUND TO IMPRESS

French designer Silvie Facon created this flowing masterpiece from old leather spines that had separated from books. It took 250 hours! More more extensive photos, plus more dresses, please follow this link.

#10 SHORT STORY

Silvie Facon also created this sassy little folded dress, again by only using books that were beyond repair. For more details, please see this link.

Feeling inspired but also maybe a tad overwhelmed by the sheer volume of talent? No worries! You can craft this simple origami newsprint dress by following the instructions here.

Pssst! We also made a Cinderella dress out of highly unusual materials! See that here.

A Very Spirited Performance

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Turn down the lights and astound your audience with tales of adventures, hauntings, and astounding plot twists! Best of all, no special screen needed…it’s parchment paper from your home pantry.

We read Gilbert the Ghost by Guido Van Genechten (Clavis, 2014). Gilbert is not like the other ghosts at Ghost School. For starters, he was born blush, not ghostly white. And while other ghosts are shouting “Booooo!” Gilbert can only say “Ba…ba…bahoo!” For this, he is banished to the Abandoned Tower. But it’s not quite abandoned, and thus begins Gilbert’s wonderful friendship with Meow the cat. The roommates claim the tower for their own, and make it into the coziest little haunt you’ve ever seen. Soon, there are many visitors, but only one ghost who can say “Bahoo!”

You’ll need:

  • A rectangle of corrugated cardboard (we used a 10″ x 14″ cake pad)
  • A theater banner from the template, printed on 8.5″ x 11″ paper
  • Small boxes to prop the theater up
  • Parchment paper
  • Black poster board
  • 3 drinking straws
  • 2 LED votive candles
  • Scissors and tape for construction
  • Markers for decorating
  • Box cutter
  • Hot glue

To create the front of your theater, cut a window into a piece of corrugated cardboard. Then use markers to decorate the cardboard stage (or use patterned tape and star stickers like we did). Add a banner from the template, and you’re done!

Flip the cardboard over, then tape or hot glue a piece of parchment paper on top of the window. This is your theater screen. Attach a strip of poster board to the bottom of the screen to create a pocket for your scenery to sit in during performances. Finish by hot gluing small boxes to the base to prop your theater up, making sure they are tall enough for two LED lights to stand on either side of the screen.

Now for the entertainment! Cut 3 pieces of scenery and 3 puppets from black poster board, then tape drinking straws to the top of the puppets.

It’s showtime! Fire up those LED votive lights and enjoy!

And while we had some wonderful ghostly tales being told at Ethan’s Pika Theater…

And some intrepid cats on adventures elsewhere in the library…

At Seraphina’s theater, there were some distinct holiday vibes happening!

Like Bats on the Beach *

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The moon is bright, the bugs are out, the weather is perfect…for a bat beach party!

We reads Bats at the Beach by Brian Lies (Clarion Books, 2006). As night rises, a bevy of bats head to the shore for some sand, waves, snacks, and a moon tan. Clever, sweet, and filled with absolutely gorgeous illustrations (the moonlight shining through the bats’ wings!), this book is an extra charming read, any time of day.

Our story time project was inspired by this amazing flying bat craft by Raising Veggie Lovers that our friend Franny spotted on Pinterest and tagged Katie…

Their version is smaller and utilizes a free printable template and a drinking straw, but we wanted to make something a little larger for our program!

You’ll need:

  • Black poster board
  • 1 paper towel tube
  • Black construction paper
  • String
  • Scissors and tape for construction
  • Metallic markers for decorating
  • Hot glue
  • Optional: paper cup beach bucket

Here’s a bird’s eye view of our version of the project. First, cut your bat’s body out of black poster board (the wing span for our bat ended up being 21.5″). Fold the bat’s head upwards, then add eyes, a nose, and a smile with metallic markers. Wrap a paper towel tube in black construction paper, then hot glue it on top of the lower half of the bat’s body.

Above, you can see where we used tape (and black dot stickers) to attach two pieces of string to each bat wing (our strings were 27.5″ in length). Thread both strings through the length of the paper towel tube, then knot them together at the bottom. We also anchored the strings to a purple foam bead to make it easier for kids to grab. Your bat is complete! Pull the strings and watch the wings flap!

How about a beach bucket? Cut the sides of a paper cup about halfway down, leaving a strip on each side that fold together at the top to form the bucket’s handle. Color and cut the shells from this beach shell template and drop them in your bucket! Finish by hot gluing the bucket to the underside of your bat.

No beach night is complete without some activities and refreshments, so Katie and I turned out the gallery lights and let kids and their bats navigate to this lighthouse (yes, that is a spinning disco light):

And here I am staffing the bug juice bar where bats could order various flavors of juices (color cotton balls in little sample cups):

Meanwhile, Katie had the beach grill going with marshmallows. These were packing peanuts mounted on  craft sticks roasted over red holidays lights:

Deluxe bugmallows were also available…these were mallows with wings and legs added, very much like the ones depicted in the book. Sooooo CUTE.

* Yes, this is a Taylor Swift reference