Every October the shops fill with plastic skeletons and orange tinsel, and every November 1st most of it goes back in the box. I have never understood that. Halloween is the one night of the year when the whole world finally agrees with me that skulls, bats, coffins and vampires belong in the home, so why not let them stay?
These are the pieces from my workshop that carry the Halloween spirit for me: a little spooky, a little theatrical, and made from real bones, real specimens and a lot of patience.
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Bats: The Heart of Halloween
This first piece is literally named after the night. In Halloween a hand-cast crow skull is surrounded by delicate mouse jaws, arranged so they look like small bats in flight. Dark, minimal and, honestly, a bit cute.
The Ritual is a bat specimen under a lace-trimmed glass cloche, suspended above crushed red velvet. Below it lies an open Necronomicon-style book of spells, a bloodied bottle, three miniature skulls, a skeletal hand, a pentagram and black feathers. A ritual interrupted, right at the good part.
Noctis Reliquary is more romantic: a preserved bat in an ornate aged gold baroque frame with a handmade deep red velvet coffin, lace and replicas of human teeth. And if you'd like a small guardian for your shelf, Nocturna Custodia is a hand-cast, hand-painted bat sculpture in gold, watchful and just 8 cm tall. You can also order her in a dark metallic finish.
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Vampires, Coffins and Stakes
No Halloween is complete without a vampire, and mine is very small. Count Mousula is a preserved mouse skeleton resting in a coffin-style box with a hinged lid, deep red velvet, lace, tiny skulls and bones, and a preserved mummified mouse heart. The Count sleeps by day. Please don't knock.
Children of the Night borrows its name from Dracula himself. It's a three-piece triptych in black and silver with crushed navy velvet, built around an ornamented bat head and surrounded by a hand-cast raven skull, a mouse skull, mummified bird feet, a vial of fox teeth and other preserved specimens.
Vampiria is made to order: a two-headed bat skeleton in a fully handmade wooden shadowbox lined with rich velvet, with miniature bats, vertebrae and a metal nameplate bearing the Latin species name.
If a vampire needs a proper bed, my Bat Wooden Coffins are built from raw wood from scratch, not assembled from ready frames. Each one holds real bat specimens against deep velvet.
And for those on the other side of the story, the made-to-order Vampire Hunter Kit comes in a hand-painted, ornamented wooden suitcase with a hand-carved vampire stake, a wooden hammer and glass vials, one of them filled with dried garlic. Please contact me before ordering.
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The Death's-Head Moth
If any insect was born for Halloween, it's Acherontia atropos, the death's-head hawk-moth, with a skull-shaped marking on its thorax and a name taken from Atropos, the Fate who cuts the thread of life. In Death's Lantern she rests among dried pumpkins and autumn flowers in a hand-cast black and gold baroque frame. In the made-to-order Moth Wooden Coffins she lies in a handbuilt coffin with velvet, metallic accents and bones.
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Graveyards in October
In Tenebris Noctis, In the Darkness of the Night, is an old cemetery in October under glass. A real raccoon skull sits beside roe deer ribs and two hand-cast skulls with a black patina, with a death's-head hawk-moth, fine cobwebs and autumn moss in dry yellow and burnt orange.
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The Cabinet of Horrors
For those who like their Halloween properly unsettling. Incubus Trium is for anyone who knows the things that visit at night are not always imagined: three mummified pigeon heads emerge from black fur, with black pigeon feet cradling a hand-cast human skull in black lace, under a glass cloche on ornate legs.
Heart Vessel is a realistic anatomical human heart, cast and hand-painted, that works as a vessel for brushes, tools or small personal objects. It's also available made to order.
Conjoined Twins Big is a sculpted depiction of conjoined infant skulls, hand-cast and hand-painted, set in a richly ornamented frame lined with black velvet. It feels both fragile and permanent, like something preserved outside of time.
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Ouija Boards and Carved Pumpkins
Every haunted house needs a library, and every library needs a librarian. In The Curator she's a real preserved tarantula, watching over shelves with an ouija board, a carved pumpkin, spell books and a skull with a skeletal hand reaching out from behind it. According to her story, the ouija board on the second shelf still answers questions, if you ask the right ones.
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Halloween That Stays
Real bones, real specimens and dried botanicals don't expire on November 1st. Keep them out of direct sunlight, dust the glass gently, and let them stay. Halloween is one night, but a love for the spooky lasts all year.
Happy haunting,
Kika