Create realistic animal decor and masks with my easy-to-use patterns.
Now, you can sculpt beautiful, long-lasting animal sculptures and masks – even if you’ve never sculpted anything before. It’s easy with my templates, some cardboard, and a layer of paper mache. Get started today – you’ll soon have a delightful work of art that your family will treasure for years.
This is not the paper mache you remember from grade school!
When done right, paper mache is strong and durable. In fact, it’s common to find paper mache sculptures that are over 100 years old in antique stores. Many galleries show original paper mache art that sells for thousands of dollars.
The big “secret” is to treat your paper mache sculptures and masks like fine art – because that’s what they are. After all, you pour your heart and soul into making them, so you want them to last.
“My very first attempt at anything to do with paper mache. It’s for a Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe display at the primary school where I work. Without the pattern I wouldn’t have known where to start, so thank you so much.”
Yasmine
Here’s how to make long-lasting paper mache sculptures and masks:
My Famous Paper Mache Clay Recipe…
I created the recipe for paper mache clay over 10 years ago.
The free recipe and the easy methods I teach for creating animal sculptures have now been used by millions of people from all over the world.
You just spread paper mache clay on your armature like a thin layer of buttercream frosting. No paper strips to tear, no messy paste, and no annoying edges of paper strips showing on the finished sculpture. After it dries it’s extremely hard and durable.
I’ve used this recipe countless times for many years, it’s the best modeling medium I’ve ever tried. Dries hard as a rock and allows for some great detail. I’ve had to break a piece off of a piece of metal and I literally had to whack it with a hammer as hard as I could a few times to get it loose. Thank you so much for inspiring my creativity!!
Dalet Bet
This Month’s Best-Selling Patterns:
Used Jonni’s pattern to make a mask for a Safari theme day at my workplace. No one believed I made it until I showed them the inside where my Shreddies boxes showed LOL. Our team used this mask and some cardboard monkey masks to set the scene for the theme day.
Karen Norris
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Masks and Sculptures Made by Our Readers:
Jonni I keep reading and rereading all of your instructions they are so helpful. My question is can the paper mache clay be layered on top of a dried layer. I need something that might be 3/4 of an inch to look like snow. Do yo think it might dry in the bottom of a Christmas ornament ball. Which recipe would work the best. Thank you so much. Gail
Hi Gail. I think you would have real problems getting the paper mache clay to dry inside a glass ball. There wouldn’t be enough air circulation for the material to dry all the way through. You can layer new paper mache clay over dry paper mache clay, but the lower levels will naturally absorb some of the water. With little air movement, that water could get trapped inside. Plaster of Paris might work – it hardens quickly and then takes a day or two to dry – but it also heats up during the hardening process, and that might help it dry faster. One of the readers on the Daily Sculptors page might have better advice for you, so you might want to ask your question on that page, too. Good luck with it!
Hi Jonni,
I am doing a project for school, we have to make an vehicle that is as efficient as possible. (like the cars for the “Shell eco marathon)
I am in charge of making the outer shell and my concerns are that pm would be too heavy or too weak.
How strong is dried pm compared to its weight?
With kind regards,
Jesse
Hi Jesse. You just asked me an engineering question, and I have no way to do the testing required to give you a reasonable answer. I think it’s fair to say that if you use paper sandwiched together with a good wood glue, the result will be as strong as an equal thickness of plywood – but I can’t test it so I don’t know if that’s true or not. I also don’t know how much your paper mache will weigh because there are so many different ways to make paper mache. Do some experiments – when you find the answers, be sure to let us know. 🙂
Thank you very much for your quick reply, Jonni. Of course you are right that experimenting is the correct way to proceed, and it’s good to know about other glue options. Best wishes.
Hi Jonni – Thank you for all your teaching and information! I am finishing a paper mache dress form, cast in halves inside plaster forms made from my body last year. The paper mache halves are all done and I need to join them together to make the final replica of my body. For various reasons, the two halves do not fit exactly together well, and I am planning to tie them together, within their plaster halves, and from inside push a mixture of glue and paper mache tightly in the crevices before letting the whole thing dry. The paper mache dress form halves were made from a mixture of cellulose insulation and liquid wallpaper adhesive (walls range from 1/2″ – 1″ thick, and were finished last year, so halves are completely dry) and I have CelluClay instant paper mache to use in the crevices. The crevices range from probably 1/4″ to maybe 3/4″ wide, and are variable in shape. If I use a mixture of the CelluClay and the wallpaper adhesive to fill in the crevices, will that be sufficient to “glue” the halves together? Thank you very much for any advice.
Hi Polly. I’m afraid I’m the wrong person to ask about a project like this. I never use CelluClay or wallpaper adhesive, so I would just be making things up if I answer you. You’ll want to run a few experiments first, to make sure it will work. If the wallpaper adhesive doesn’t work, you can experiment with a PVA glue (Elmer’s Glue-All in the US) or wood glue, instead. Good luck with it!
Need a paper machet shepard orcard board shepard
Hi Anne. I don’t have a pattern for a shepherd sculpture. I do have a video that shows how to make your own internal pattern for a sculpture, based on a photo or drawing. You can see it here.
Hi Jonnie
My papier-mâché clay is basically a liquid could you say what might be causing this? Thankyou.
Did you press out most of the water before adding the paper to the mix? That’s the only think I can think of – unless you’re using a product other than drywall joint compound. Tell us the specific brands and quantities you used, and we should be able to figure it out.
Ok, thanks I think that I didn’t squeeze enough water out because water is starting to come to the top.
You can add more flour to see if you can get it to work. It might not, but it’s worth a try.
Ok thanks
Hey Jonni,
I’m looking for a very specific paper mâché clay recipe. If you have one that meets the following criteria, could you point me in the right direction? Due to the pandemic and toilet paper shortage I’m looking for something that uses newspaper instead, preferably without flour (worried about mold) that can still be flattened smoothly, AND can be air-dried. I really liked the recipe using marble powder, but I know you tested that one in the oven and wasn’t sure how it would do air drying. Please let me know! Thank you! <3
Hi Lauren. I only used the oven because I wanted to get the video done faster. All of my recipes dry just as hard without heat. It sounds like the recipe with marble powder would work best for you.
Hello
— I am Emad Hamdy from Egypt .
— Thank you so much for your creativity .
— I wish you more success and success .
— I would like to show you some of my own works after I was able to learn some of your technique, but the implementation is in my own style, and I hope you like it.
Hello Emad. We would love to see your work. You can upload a few photos by clicking the yellow button on this page.