The Golden Crown of Bethmoora

Luke Goss as Prince Nuada with the golden crown

Materials used:

- Paper

- 2mm craft foam

- 4mm craft foam

- Acrylic paint

- Gloss laquer/varnish

- Flat surfaced paint brushes

- Pen and scissors

- Worbla (optional)

- Crafting knife

When me and my boyfriend decided that we would cosplay as Nuala and Nuada from Hellboy 2 this autumn, we were well aware that a variety of props and accessories needed to be made.

Seeing as Erik (boyfriend) would have the most challenging costume with many different parts, both armor and cloth, I volunteered to make the golden crown. Because the only thing I dislike about Nuala's outfit is its lack of details and hard props, which is why I'd gladly make the crown for Erik, just for something to do, haha. I'm not a very good seamstress and I seriously needed some good old-fashion crafting to take my mind of all the sewing!

The first thing I had to do was actually the hardest - gather reference photos. There are -no- good close up photos of the crown, so I did the next best thing; I bought the movie and played it in high-res on my tv, pausing to snap photos of the crown in detail! Trust me, it was an eeeendless process of rewinding, zooming and pausing. If anyone needs a batch of gazillion photos of the crown of Bethmoora, let me know. 

Drawing out the patterns in paper

After I got the reference photos, I started drawing out the pattern on paper. The crown needed to fit Erik's head - with a wig on - so I measured around his head and cut out a paper circle that fit his head, which I then used to measure and work on as a base for the crown.

I created a paper mock.up of the general shape of the crown's three parts, and obviously I had to adjust the shape a bit to fit Erik's head. When you make this type of prop it's important to take into account if the person is going to wear a wig/hat/other under it, to make sure the size fits!

After the paper crown was finished, I cut out the three general shapes in the thick craft foam (4mm). I chose to make the crown in foam because it's easy to cut in and work with, and it's easy to coat and varnish afterwards. However, as most of you know who has ever worked with craft foam, it's also very floppy and not very sturdy. This is why I attached a backside of worbla to the crown, to give it some stability. 

Finished paper crown, looks huge on my tiny wig-head.
Wig is the base of my Nuala wig.

I cut out a shape of worbla just as big as the backside of the foam, and shaped it around Erik's head. If you won't have access to Worbla, there are many other materials that work just as well. Stiff cardboard, pizza boxes, foamboard, plastic, just about anything stiff you can find.

With the base of the crown cut out in thick foam, I started with the never-ending work of making the details in the thin foam. This took a lot of time. I chose to make a texture in the crown with thinner foam just because it's nice to get a 3D-feeling of it, rather than to just paint on the pattern on the thick foam.

I experimented with cutting with both scissors and crafting knives, and really both work, it's just a matter of your own preference.

Some pieces of the thin foam.
It helps to have the two foam types in different colors!

Luckily, the crown is made out of three repeated pieces (plus the front piece), which meant that I only had to make three patterns that I could repeat over and over.

I think I watched through almost an entire season of Family Guy while drawing out and cutting these pieces. This type of craft foam is so thin and fragile, some parts are impossible to cut with a knife and you'll have to use a scissor.

Of course, this is not something you HAVE to do, if you want to you can just draw out the pattern onto the thick foam, but I wanted the crown to cast natural shadows (I have a thing for natural shadows) so that's why I went through all this work. It really pays off in the end!

Placing the thin foam on the thick to get a sense of it!

With all the pieces cut out, I placed them on top of the thick foam, just to get the general shape. After I was satisfied with how it looked, I glued the thin foam onto the thick foam (which I already cut out).

When it comes to glue, I tried out different types and techniques. It's almost impossible to apply the glue onto the thin foam without having the glue dry before you're done applying it, which is why I chose to glue on the thick foam instead and then just press the thin foam on to it.

This was impossible with hot glue, since it dries super fast and is very thick and hard to spread over the thick foam without getting a rough surface. So in the end I opted for clear all-around glue, which takes longer to dry, giving you more time to adjust the placement of the thin foam bits.

Before and after first layer of detail paint. To the left is
only spray paint, and right is first layer of acrylics.

After all the pieces were glued together, I sprayed a layer of gold on it. For spray paint I always use Molotow paint, it lasts longer, attaches to basically everything and is of great quality.

When the thing was sprayed, it was time for detail paint, my favorite! I always work with acrylics for this type of detail on foam. Starting out with the dark colors, I filled inthe corners and nooks of the crown, creating shadows. Then I work my way on to lighter and lighter colors, ending up with almost white on the outer edges.

For the black lines on the crown I simply used a black gel-marker. It applies color and also dents the foam to create a crevice-effect. Perfect.

When it comes to detail painting gold, I love LOVE using different shades of gold. Just mixing gold with silver or black creates gorgeous colors which you really can lift a piece with. Remember, a good paint job can cover up a crappy craft job.

After it was painted, I applied many layers of laquer/varnish to give it a stiff surface and some shine. There are maaany types of laquer, so you really just have to test on small pieces of foam and chose the best one for yourself :)

This is how the crown ended up (it's not attached to each other in this photo, only taped together). As you can see it looks HUGE on my tiny head, but this is why I shaped it around Erik's head and not mine :)