Thread: Traditional Jack O' Lanterns

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Looking around at the variety of carving kits out there got me thinkin', and I figured you guys were the best folks to talk to about this.

I actually had a pattern published in Pumpkin Masters (Harvest Moon was the name) and the wife got an Elegance award from them the same year, so complex carving is well-loved in our house. We're both proven carvers.

But even so, I find I have a real love of classic faces, getting the dimensions and the proportions just right for a particular expression, playing with subtle varieties on triangular or circular eyes, toothy grins, nose or no nose, nose type, that sort of thing.
It got so I was doing famous Jacks for awhile. I recreated the Jack from the opening credits of "Halloween", the one drawn on Charlie Brown's Head, the one Disney's Headless Horseman threw at the screen. One year I hope to do all four of the Jacks that fall to the fence finials in the opening sequence of "The Nightmare Before Christmas", you know... "Pumpkins scream in the dead of night.." I'm wanting to carve Jack Skellingtons scarecrow head one year, but that same jack features in Sleepy Hollow (on a scarecrow), so I'm bidding my time until I'm really in a scarecrow mood. No doubt the movie "Trick 'R Treat" will provide me some good options as well, when I'm not doing my own original faces.
That grinning face is the ultimate essence of the holiday for me. I'm so taken with it I consider the smashed remains in the street an honorable death for a faithful guardian.

So my question is, with all the complex scenes and characters carved on pumpkins these days, do any of you still favor the classic Jack, leering from your porch at the sidewalk?

I do intrecante carvings every year with fake pumpkins, but always buy real pumpkins and carve them out classic. gotta have the classics! somehow wouldn't feel right without them. also, love !!!the smell of burning pumpkin. sorry for spelling

I do, Spats. I never really thought about it until you asked!
The 'face' JOL as opposed to a design, appeals to me because, like you said, it is THE emblem of Halloween. But also I picture a kid designing the face, with a mom or dad helping them get it 'just right', and it being sort of a home-made craft they did together. It makes that halloween/childhood connection that I feel so strongly about. How many holidays still have such a child/family activity?
Of course designs can be done by kids too, I just remember the simple faces from my own childhood I guess.

When those Pumpkinmasters kits first started coming out I was really into doing the intricate scenes because it was something new that most people hadn't seen before. But when the kits became more widely available and everyone started doing them, I kind of lost interest. I went back to doing traditonal faces not only because the patterns were no longer new to a lot of people, but also because the old-fashioned jack-o'-lanterns just had more appeal for me. I felt like I needed to get back to the roots of Halloween. I still draw the faces on paper and pin them to the pumpkin and punch the lines in with a sharp object and I still use the tools that came with the kits. But as for doing all the intricate work, the novelty wore off.

We do a mix of both. Certain PM patterns are pretty neat. We've carved a few of our favorites into foam pumpkins so we have them year to year. But...I love the traditional jol face and always display a few of these in our display. As mentioned, it's a Halloween icon and tradition, at least one I grew up with sitting around the kitchen table with my dad, brother and sister carving our little pumpkins for the porch.
I love the faces from pumpkin rot and incorporate a lot of his designs.

What a great thread. Spats, do you have pictures of the faces you are talking about? You must have a ton. I'm sure a lot of us would love to see them as inspiration.

Charlie

Absolutely, I go with "Traditional" Jacks right down the line. Candles? Nothing but. Some things in Life just shouldn't be messed with.

Yes, while I truly appreciate the artistic qualities of Pumpkin Masters and the like, nothing makes me feel the Halloween spirit like an old fashioned jack o'lantern with a flickering candle!

Traditional for me. I'll do other fun stuff like a paw print for the dog's pumpkin or "Trick or Treat" or "Happy Halloween"...

You could say I stick with cutting-edge technology, without getting too involved with cutting-edge technology.

I have great admiration for the complex carving, but I'm a traditional gal - classic jack o' lanterns around here, and we use real candles. It wouldn't feel like Halloween without that smell of singed pumpkin and the subtle flickering that only a candle provides. I sometimes rub cinnamon on the lids and it smells like pumpkin pie when the flames warm it!

That being said, I'm an artist (graphic designer, but I have a degree in illustration/painting) and my DH is also a graphic designer, so we do some pretty impressive designs within the classic face restrictions - depending on how much time we've allowed for carving. It gets the short end of the broomstick some years, as we get around 8-12 pumpkins that are sprinkled throughout our yard and porch.

We also add red glass beads that are used in floral displays (in the vases) as pupils for some, and those pumpkins look quite wicked!