How to Make A Haunted House Part 3: Wall Construction

Here i will explain a couple of dirrefent ways to build wall panels for your haunted house.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. There are many different ways to build your wall panels for your haunt. Some materials used in haunted houses are black plastic, plywood, stage currents, and in some home haunts cardboard (not recommended). Now for home haunts for the most part you aren’t going to be inspected so you can use what you want just be sure it will hold up to patrons moving through the haunt. You don’t want to stop the line half way through the night to re-secure a wall.

2. For those on a budget there are a few different ways to build really cheap wall panels. First you can use black plastic. I used the plastic my first couple of years. It comes in rolls of 10’ x100’ that is what I normally use. I cut the plastic to size and then staple it to the ceiling. By doing this you can create a whole maze through the garage. I used the plastic to cover the main walls and then hung in the desired place to make different rooms and then cut slits in it to make doorways. The problem with black plastic is that it is not very durable. It rips tears easily and gets ripped down from the ceiling, and then you have to go in and fix it. The black plastic you buy from the hard ware store isn’t fire retardant so that is also a negative. For home haunts it isn’t a big deal as long as you are safe about it.

3. 
   Fence Picket Panel

   Another cheap method is to use old fence panels and either 2x4’s or 2x2’s. You can find fence panels on someone’s curb around trash day. Disassemble the panels and get all the nails out of the pickets. Once you have done this cut the tips off the end so you have a picket with both straight ends. Once all the pickets have the ends cut off you are ready to construct your walls. Make a frame of either 2x2’s or 2x4’s. I would recommend 2x2’s these get very heavy. Make the frame 4’x8’ and then cut your pickets down to 4’ to go across the frame. Start at the top of the frame and secure the picket on each end with a screw. Do this all the way down until the entire frame is covered on one side. These look really good when you are done. Since the wood is all weathered it gives it a very natural look. The good thing about these panels is that they are cheap. The fence pickets are free so all you have to buy are 2x2’s and screws. The panels will have cracks in between the slats which gives the haunt a really eerie mansion feel. Now that is also a down side since the walls have cracks in them make sure your aren’t trying to hide stuff you don’t want people seeing, until they are in that room, on the other side. Another down side is that these panels are very heavy and difficult to move around. These panels are very sturdy as well as cheap to build. Each panels costs less than $5 to make.

4. Pallets are also another cheap way to make wall panels. These are similar to the pickets in the sense you can see through them. These are good for making mazes outside. Get a hold of as many pallets as you can and stand them on end. Stack another pallet on top of it and screw them together using a small 2’x4’. You should now have a wall panel roughly 3’ wide by 8’ tall. Now use these to make a maze with as many twists and turns as you can get. Use 2’x4’s to secure the maze across the top and were ever else needed to make the structure secure.

5. Now for indoor use as standard wall panels I use 2’x’2 framing with a sheet of plywood across the frame. You build these the same way you did when using the pickets but instead of pickets you just secure the plywood to the front of the frame instead of pickets. Now you can paint the plywood however you want to match the theme of the room. If you are doing a mansion theme you can wall paper the top half and then place a strip of molding going across the plywood half down the panel and then paint the bottom half whatever color you want to match the room and give it a distressed weathered look. If you are doing an Egyptian theme, paint the walls a tan color and then use black paint to make hieroglyphics. The possibilities are endless just use your imagination. Once all your panels are built stand them up and secure them together on the ends. Make sure you have 90 degree angles throughout your construction to make the walls stand on their own as well as making the structure very sturdy. These panels can take a lot of abuse and aren’t too heavy to move.

6. In my haunt I used a combination of the picket, pallet, and plywood panels. But for standard panels I would recommend using the plywood method throughout the majority of the haunt and only use the other two methods as needed in specific parts of the haunt.