Don't Blink!

**MacabreRob** · 10-17-2011,11:21 AM

The time had finally arrived to dress my girls. They are almost finished except for clothing and color. I had bought a set of twin bed sheets at Good Will previously, and looked up how to create their garb. They will wear on outfit from Ancient Greece known as a "Peplos". It's basically a rectangle of fabric folded across the body and pinned at the shoulders. Women in more modest cities would also sew up the edges on the one side. Since I did not finish the legs on the Angels, they must have come from one of these more modest cities...

After measuring and cutting for size, I dressed Lilith. I can see now why women had slaves or servants help them dress, this thing is awkward. I eventually got it, and sewed up the shoulders where normally it would be pinned. When it came time to do Angelica, I ran into a bit of an issue. Her outfit was being made from the fitted sheet, which was a bit smaller than the top sheet Lilith was wearing, and once I released the stitches from the corners, there were 10" squares missing. I had to cut patches out of some rags in the garage and replace the missing bits.

Lilith getting ready to be dressed for success.

Dressed in her hot pink peplos.

Angelica is in tears because both she and her sister wore the same outfit to the party.

After both were dressed, I took some waxed string and tightly pinched the dress at the join between the top and bottom halves, so that some of the fabric was pulled inside. This was so I would have something to attach the dress to the body form. I tacked all the folds and pleates were they were, then cut the fabric, freeing both halves of their bodies from each other. Afterwards, I stapled the fabric down so that the folds stayed put.

Once that was done, the next step was to coat all of it with Monster Mud. Generally the idea is to put the cloth into the Mud to saturate it, but I knew I would never get it like I wanted that way and settled for applying it with a brush. Very tedious and tiring. Towards the end, I just glopped it on with my hands. I've added a second coat already to the leg sections, because it's more or less freestanding and more likely to be damaged than the top section, which has the cloth right next to the body form.

Tacking the edge of the sections to hold the creases in place.

Added reinforcements to the legs while I still have easy access to them.

Exposing the mounting holes for the wings.

Monster mud applied to the lower half of one of the Angels, and no, she's not supposed to look like the Statue of Liberty.

Monster mud all over Angelica's blouse.

**MacabreRob** · 10-24-2011,07:22 AM

After painting all the individual components on my Weeping Angels, I staked out some rebar in the back yard and assembled them for the first time in their finished state. The arms gave me some grief. I had removed them to paint everything after monster mudding, and some of the material must have shifted. I finally got them seated in properly and you can hardly see the seams.

The base color was some grayish-brown that was Oops paint from the local hardware stone. I stippled two shades of gray on everything with a sponge and they look pretty good. Next step is aging with the black patina, but it was getting dark on Saturday when I took these shots, so I deferred to the next day.

Angelica with the base color applied

Lilith with the base color applied

My Weeping Angels are done! Maggie and I moved them to the front yard were I applied the black wash to give them their patina and they turned out great. When the paint dried, I hit them with some spray varish to toughen up their skins a bit. I positioned them to the left and right of the big oak tree out front. I will be hitting them with my mini spotlights soon so they will show up at night.

Lilith, finished in the Cemetery

Angelica, finished in the Cemetery

Close up of Angelica from the side, showing the aged patina

Another close up of Angelica

Close up of Lilith's patina

Another close up of Lilith