How to Make Elaborate Castles With Cardboard Boxes

Cardboard can be a versatile sculptural medium.

People are often surprised at the level of elaborate sculptural detail that can be achieved with a material as ubiquitous as cardboard. Looking at the work of cardboard artists such as Mark Langan and Alex Uribe can help not only give you ideas but also illustrate the visual complexity that cardboard has to offer. Although you have to be willing to put considerable time into making elaborate castles out of cardboard, there are few limits outside your imagination to what you can do with nothing more than cardboard, glue and a craft knife.

Things You'll Need

• Corrugated cardboard
• Flat cardboard (cereal boxes)
• Craft knife
• Hot glue gun
• Glue sticks
• White glue
• Ruler
• Pencil
• Compass

Instructions

1. Make at least four towers out of pieces of heavy cardboard to serve as corner supports for your castle. Measure to find the height and circumference appropriate to your castle towers. Draw and cut out the measured rectangle so that the S-shaped corrugated lines are on the edge that will be the top of the tower. Measure and mark vertical lines every half inch along the rectangle with a pencil and ruler.

2. Use your craft knife to carefully cut along the vertical lines, cutting only the outer paper surface of the cardboard. Avoid cutting the corrugated cardboard in between the smooth layers. When each of the lines has been cut in this fashion, you can roll the cardboard, cut side out, to make a neatly sectioned round tower. Secure the edges of your segmented tower with a line of white glue. Use glue sparingly to avoid warping in the cardboard.

3. Use the lighter weight cardboard to draw a triangle that can be rolled and glued into a cone to top each tower. Although the triangle can be any height, the base must be at least equal in width to the circumference of the tower. Use the hot glue gun to glue the four towers onto a cardboard base as corners for the castle.

4. Build up the cardboard walls for your castle. Measure four equal rectangles of the lighter cardboard, wide enough to extend between the towers. To make the walls more elaborate, cut an intricate pattern of windows with your craft knife before gluing the walls into place.

5. Add details to the basic castle to make your piece more elaborate. Add buttress-like supports to the outer walls of the castle. Using light cardboard, measure each buttress to be the same height as the walls. Use a compass to draw a sloping curve on one side so the buttress becomes wider toward the bottom. The opposing side should be straight. Apply a line of glue to attach the straight edge perpendicular to the castle wall. Glue a line of buttresses at regularly spaced intervals.

6. Create a series of smaller towers to add to the complexity of your castle. Measure heavy cardboard rectangles that are both shorter and narrower in circumference than the four corner towers. Repeat the process of cutting vertical slits in the outside to make the tube and creating cones for the tops. Glue the extra towers in clusters around the main support towers to make your castle composition more visually dynamic.

Tips & Warnings

• Hot glue guns make a strong bond, but they can be messy. Use the hot glue gun only for gluing the main walls to the cardboard base. Use white glue for detail work.

• Some additional details for an elaborate castle could include cardboard flags to top towers, a drawbridge or detailed decoration with acrylic paint.

References

• StormtheCastle.com: Make a Paper and Cardboard Medieval Castle
• WebUrbanist.com: 5 Amazing Cardboard Artists and Their Sculptures