How To Turn a Chicken Wire Ghost Sculpture into a Garden Dress Form Topiary

One  Saturday morning a couple of years ago while browsing Pinterest I ran across this idea of making sculpture out of chicken wire.  Luckily I had just enough leftover chicken wire behind the Honey House that I thought I'd give it a whirl. My first version had a bow in the back that I later removed.  

I rolled the chicken wire into a tube and twisted the ends together using wire cutters. I didn't stop to get my camera to take pics along the way, but it was a matter of simply scrunching it together with my hands (wear gloves!), twisting some loose ends, and cutting off excess. This is one of the most satisfying crafts I've done in a while. I loved being able to walk all the way around a project.

Start to finish it took about 3 hours and cost nothing since I already had the wire. I love the way she looks in the garden at dusk. It would be fun to make several of these and spray them with glow in the dark paint for the front lawn on Halloween. Right now she's just a fun representation of the very feminine vibe of the bees and hens in the garden.

 

I loved her just like this but this spring I decided it would be fun to fill her out a bit more. Less ghostlike, more like a topiary in dress form. I had some sheet moss I had purchased on sale and I used floral wire to wrap it onto the form. I planted two pots of ivy, one that sits on the ground and one that sits in a plant stand near where her waist is. I pulled the ivy through the wire and used some bits of moss here and there to help fill in while I'm waiting for the ivy to grow thicker. 

I think she looks very elegant and is cheering up a dreary corner of our patio. But I'm already thinking about more ghostly dress sculptures I can make. So stay tuned for those at some point in the future.