Cast Concrete ornaments

Casting decorative objects for the home and yard is an entertaining and creative exercise in handling concrete. Locating and making forms is a challenge itself, and the specific nature of the objects you eventually cast is often dictated by the potential you see in everyday objects that you encounter.

The best forms for casting are rigid or semirigid with a slick surface and the ability to contain water. Plastic and rubber objects are ideal, but you can really use just about any material, especially if you use it for a single casting and are not concerned about breaking it when you release the cast object. Some examples of useful “found” forms include five-gallon plastic buckets (insert a smaller bucket or a tube to cast a large concrete pot); trash can lids (pavers); nesting plastic bowls (pots and planters); or any sphere shapes, such as a basketball, that can be split in two (decorative orbs, bowls).

Making your owns forms is another fun exercise in creativity. Melamine-coated particleboard is a great material for this job because it holds its shape and the concrete will not stick to the surface. When combined with other materials such as the metal flashing used to form the patio tabletop in this chapter, your casting options are practically unlimited.

For more complex and sophisticated castings, you can buy reusable forms in a very wide array of shapes and sizes. Garden benches, birdbaths, landscape edging, pavers, and statuary are just some of the objects you can cast with a couple bags of concrete and a purchased form. The best source for concrete casting forms is the Internet (see Resources section).

One of the best reasons to cast your own decorative and functional objects from concrete is that you can customize the finished look by coloring the concrete or using creative surface treatments such as the footsteps in the pavers seen below.