Easter Designs

Crown and Thorns

Brian Tetter from Frederick Christian Fellowship Church in Frederick, MD brings us this cross and thorny crown combination.

He saw the “Beautiful Thorns” and “Crowing Achievement” designs on CSDI and wanted something like that for Easter. He ordered online pool noodles (10 regular sized, 9 extra large 4″ dia, and about 20 regular sized, solid without a hole). He made 2 rings of each the large and small, connecting them with wood dowels. Brian carved them with a hot knife – 12″ to 18″ pieces of the solid noodles for the thorns.

The thorns were glued in a notch (cut with the hot knife) with gorilla glue. He used a couple cans of great stuff to add texture and help hold the rings together, and painted with several coats of different colors of brown paint. The cross was 3 layers of 2″ foamboard with the top layer chiseled up to make it rough and then painted brown with a black glaze. The fabric they had from a previous set. The cost was about $180 for the noodles and $100 for the foam plus glue and paint which he had on hand.

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Rockies Circles of Love

16 responses to “Crown and Thorns”

  1. debbie says:

    This was such an awesome stage. The crown was incredible. Brian you rock!

  2. susan says:

    Beautiful job. Love that it was made with pool noodles!

  3. I really like the concept. Very simple but very powerful.

  4. Syreeta says:

    How much to rent or purchase?

  5. Heidi Coomer says:

    Did you use Gorilla Wood Glue or another type of gorilla glue. Also, what did you spray the noodles with to get a different varying texture? Thanks in advance,

    Heidi Coomer

    • Brian Tetter says:

      I used the regular expanding gorilla glue to glue in the spikes. I cut out small sections of the noodles with a hot knife and used a heat gun to deform the noodles a bit. I sprayed “great stuff” over the noodles and smeared it around (wearing latex gloves).

  6. C. C. says:

    Hi, can you tell what type of paint you all used on the noodles. We are looking to do something similar this Easter.

    • Brian Tetter says:

      For starters, I rubbed some “great stuff” on the noodles to help fill the cavities, then primmed white latex. As you can see in the pictures, this didn’t totally cover the color of the noodles. I used brown latex paint to paint the entire thing until it covered the other colors. They I used several different colors of spray paint to add all the variations. Hope that helps. -brian

  7. Tim says:

    How did you get the noodles clamped so that way the gorilla glue would bond?

    • Brian says:

      I did the bulk of the gluing together of the noodles with “great stuff”. While I had the crown hanging from the ceiling, I just sprayed some great stuff between the noodles where they touched. I used more great stuff than gorilla glue to attach the thorns, but just taped them into place where needed temporarily.

  8. Amy Avey says:

    Looks amazing…what is the finished diameter?

  9. David Moore says:

    Brian,
    Thank you for posting this detailed outline of how to make the crown of thorns. I just made a tomb for our church for Easter that was 14’w x 8’H x 9″ thick. I made it out of Styrofoam and used a hot knife and hot wire to cut and form the styrofoam to give it a rock like surface/appearance. Last week our pastor told me he already knew what he wanted for next year and it was a huge crown of thorns. Ours will be 10ish feet in diameter. My thoughts immediately went from pipe insulation to pool noodles and your article solidified my thoughts. I used Great Stuff to glue the styrofoam together so I was thinking of that and you confirmed it. The idea of notching the noodles, using two different sizes, and using the solid ones and hot wire for the thorns were things I hadn’t thought of. Also using Great Stuff to form and holdit all together was also a great idea.
    I just wanted to say GREAT JOB and thank you for your article that is still helping others out nearly 10 years later.

  10. Rosa Elena Juarez Mendez says:

    excelente trabajo, esta pascua primero Dios vamos hacer una para la semana de ejercicios de los niños en mi parroquia., Dios los bendiga

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