FRANKENSTEIN'S BRIDE UNBOXED

Roughly a year after purchasing the Bride of Frankenstein prop from Home Depot online, we finally unboxed and started to assemble it. The size of the prop's base stand was surprisingly larger than anticipated and its rear triangular support created a conundrum regarding being able to open our front storm door with the porch barricade prop in place. The solution was to move the barricade off the porch itself and place it on some additional 8" x 16" concrete pavers on top of the 16" square pavers we typically reserve for jack-o'-lanterns. Conundrum solved! The Bride's head is rather impressive looking. Online we assumed it was molded plastic, but it appears to be a silicone mask over a solid head form. We say "silicone" because it doesn't have the latex mask smell and feels more flexible than vinyl masks. If you have ever looked into quality pro sculpted silicone horror masks, you know they run $600 and up, so this makes the Home Depot Bride prop a real bargain. We do not intend to use the animatronic features or the light up eyes on this prop. Realism is what we're aiming for with this year's haunt theme, and the Bride's eyes look very real as is. We don't want to make the prop look cheesy!

2026 Aedicula Headstone Prop Progress

Got the new aedicula painted yesterday and installed the permanent decorative corbels and appliques on it today. Just needs its final antiquing coat. We combined what was left of our Cape Cod Gray Behr Textured DeckOver paint with what was left over of our Quartz Stone Behr Exterior flat paint for the base color on this aedicula. It's currently a very light gray, but once the watered down exterior flat black paint is applied for the antiquing coat, it will be a darker gray and will look more like granite/marble in appearance.

Grim Greenery

We think our 2023 "Swamp Skeletons" may have inspired these 2026 Target "Grim Greenery" Skeletons (currently only available online). Our swamp skeletons were actually older Target pose-n-stay skeletons that we painted with an array of Rustoleum camouflage color matte spray paints, installed battery powered red LED lights behind red Fender amp jewel dome power indicator light covers for eyes, and draped with creepy clothe. But, as we've learned over the years, spray painting these plastic skeletons turns the plastic extremely brittle, it's their last hurrah so to speak, and sadly are "nevermore". But we liked the look of these Target Grim Greenery skeletons so much that we ordered a few to some day use in a haunt! We're always curating props that catch our eye for future haunt themes. We even picked up a few items at At Home the other weekend after seeing Pumkinrot's post for inside our house and for this year's haunt.

2026 Prop Builds & New Additions

Our new 2026 aedicula style headstone prop built and ready to be painted. This one is going in the front yard cemetery space on Halloween. After it's painted and antiqued, the copper patina finished corbels for the side columns and the Victorian style appliques for the base's front and sides will be added permanently. We have a wide array of copper patina plaques for the top pediment and main body for this Halloween and future ones to choose from. Also to go with our 2026 "Frankenstein's Bride" theme we purchased some warm amber Edison LED bulbs to go in our garage carriage lights and found similar (although unfortunately not as warm looking in hue) rechargeable outdoor rated Edison LED bulb lanterns that have removable hanging arms. A pair will hang from the front porch and a pair will sit on our column props flanking each side of our front door. Because we did a laboratory themed vignette with Frankenstein's monster on our front porch for our 2022 Classic Horror Movie Monsters theme we are going for a different look this year.

Spray Paint Aged Copper Patina Finish

Finished painting the various plaques, corbels, and appliques that will adorn our 2026 aedicula headstone. We used a combination of 4 different spray paint colors to achieve the "aged copper patina" finish. The goal was to try to match the finish of a purchased faux Jacob Marley door knocker plaque. We used Montana Cans Black series "Mermaid" as a base coat, followed by a light coat of Rustoleum "Aged Copper", followed by Montana Cans Black series "Copper Green" and "Seal" colors. Three wood appliques were the test subjects before committing to the spray paint technique. A final coat of Rustoleum clear matte enamel spray paint was applied to weather protect the pieces. 

2026 Aedicula Headstone Prop Build

Going to be adding a new aedicula style headstone prop to our haunt this year. Once again the aedicula will have various different main body center plaques that can be swapped out for various haunt themes. We like the copper patina paintjob on a faux Jacob Marley plaque we got from an Etsy shop and the goal is going to be to try to match that finish on all the other plaques and adornments that will be used on the new aedicula headstone.

Candelabra Mods

We purchased a pair of these 47" tall standing candelabras from Amazon last year. While they were a good deal price wise at the time, they are rather light weight and top heavy with faux LED candles. We had a pair of 2.5 pound enamel coated iron disc weights from an old weight bar set that we were able to install on the candelabra bases. The candelabra bases and stand poles are hollow and screw together. We were able to fit threaded rods through the existing holes in the bases. With a nylon locking nut on each end of the threaded rods along with 2" washers on the bottoms, the disc weights are held firmly in place. Much less likely for the candelabras to tip over from a strong gust of wind and you can't tell the disc weights were added to them.