The Full Da Vinci
Recreating the Vitruvian Man, one zip tie at a time
Our family loves making DIY costumes, as I described last year. This year was no different, with my twins morphing into Gru and Dru complete with SFX noses. So, naturally, when my youngest son said “Da Vinci,” I heard “art supply run,” and we were off to the races…
Confession #1: The Vitruvian Man was our backup costume.
Confession #2: In my family, there’s no such thing as “going too far” for Halloween.
Confession #3: Our first idea was to re-create The Creation of Adam from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel.
Now, hear me out: My son, whose shoulder-length wavy mane could easily go thunderbolt grey with baby powder, would be God.
We would paint the sky on a double-wide canvas attached to a PVC pipe stuffed into his backpack – this technique had once worked to hover an alien space craft over his head.
Easy, right?
It was Adam that stumped us. A logical option would be to have a friend play the role.
My son demurred. Too easy.
How about a mannequin?
I resisted the urge to search up “inflatable mannequins,” lest the algorithm peg me wrong.
(I did discover a quiet curiosity about Roxy Display in New Brunswick, NJ, with its 5,200 body parts.)
Deflated, I described our costume quest to my sister.
“Are you insane?!” she scoffed. This stung, coming from a fellow crafter who has been known to hand-dye moth wings and home-make satyr legs.
So we pivoted to our less ambitious backup option: Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Vitruvian Man.
Once again, my son’s hair was the gateway, bearing a striking resemblance to that of Michael Hutchence of the ‘90s band INXS. Perfect for our Renaissance man.
The first question: how to construct the iconic circle and square, depicting the ideal proportions.
For the circle, an obvious answer seemed to be an over-sized hula hoop. It turns out none are big enough for a full arm span.
Gemini rescued me with the suggestion of fiberglass tent poles – which are both lightweight and bendable.
Within days, I was piecing together a flexibly-sized, sturdy circle and square, which we wrapped in brown electrical tape for a vintage drawing-on-parchment look.
Next , we were onto crafting the man himself.
A flesh-colored body suit was out. There was no way a middle schooler would don anything with even a whiff of nudity.
“How about we give him some funny boxer shorts?” I mused, “Maybe printed with spam cans (‘Vitruvian Spam’)? A pair of pajamas? A Hawaiian shirt?”
My son flicked each of my suggestions away with a dismissive wave — too declassé.
An Amazon search for “Muscle shirt” returned a padded shirt. It was minimally suggestive or embarrassing — perfect.
We decided to studiously ignore the lower body for now.
Next came the extra limbs. Fresh from my “mannequin arms and legs” search for Adam, I knew that option would be both creepy and impractical (too heavy).
Then I remembered visiting Weta Workshop in New Zealand. Sculptor Kim Beaton had demonstrated how to make light-weight sculptures out of aluminum foil and a substance called Pal Tiya. I ordered a bag of Pal Tiya and some bulk tin foil.
Within days, I was sculpting flesh onto aluminum foil musculature.
As I made my way through my 50-lb bag of Pal Tiya, I realized that while aluminum may be lightweight, Pal Tiya is basically cement.
No way that tentpoles would support it.
I imagined my son dropping a cement arm on a preschooler during the Halloween parade.
I heaved a sigh to match the weight of the limbs, and headed back to the drawing board.
My sister, in her infinite wisdom, suggested the ultimate crafting material: cardboard.
I sketched arms and legs on an old box, cut them out with a box-cutter (after a futile search for an Ex-acto knife which is no doubt in the same black hole that eats every. single. pair. of scissors.)
A coat of flesh-colored acrylic paint, and some permanent marker details later, and we were done.
Except for the nude bottom.
That’s when my son had a genius idea.
“Mom,” he said, “I have an extra pair of blue jeans, and two pairs of the same sneakers. Why not put the jeans and shoes on the cardboard legs?”
Done.
Not to mention, this solved the question of how the extra legs would stand up. We simply slipped a belt through belt-loops of both pairs of jeans, buckling it tightly so the extra legs were strapped to my son’s body.
Now came the final assembly. Zip ties did the job, tying the circle to the square, the hands and shoes to the circle. Fini!
But how to get the thing to school? The width was at least 5 feet. Our solution? Stick it on top of my husband’s midlife crisis sports car and hold on to it while driving to school at 15 miles an hour with flashers on.
Eh voila! The Vitruvian Man costume was a triumph — if by “triumph” you mean “required its own zip code.”
Still, for one glorious Halloween afternoon, my son embodied the perfect proportions of art, science, creative problem-solving, and DIY ambition. Happy Halloween!
Vitruvian Man Costume How-To
Materials
1 package of fiberglass tentpoles
1 package of zipties
1 men’s muscle shirt
1 roll brown electrical tape
2 - 4 large pieces of cardboard for arms and legs
Scissors
Box cutter
Ruler
Pencil
Cutting mat or cardboard
Hot glue gun and glue sticks
Brown fat-tip marker
Flesh and ochre acrylic paint
Paint brush
2 pairs of pants
2 pairs of shoes
1 belt
How-to
Measure your arm span to determine the width of the circle’s circumference.
Connect tent poles into a circle. Secure the connections with hot glue (optional). Wrap in brown electrical tape.
Connect tent poles to create a square with a side length equal to the circle’s circumference. Wrap each length in brown electrical tape.
Cut four T-shapes out of cardboard. Fold each T in half lengthwise, making four L-shaped corners. Apply hot glue to the insides of the cardboard, stick the tent poles in and press down. Wrap with brown electrical tape.
Draw the arms and legs on cardboard with a pencil, using the picture of the Vitruvian Man to calculate proportions and conversions.
Cut out the arms and legs with a box cutter. If needed, cut out an extra piece of cardboard to connect the two arms so that the entire span matches the width of the circle.
Mix the flesh and ochre acrylic paint until you get a skin tone you like.
Paint the arms and legs with acrylic paint.
Once dry, add an outline and details with a brown fat-tip marker.
Place the jeans and shoes over the legs. Thread the belt through the belt loops, leaving it unbuckled.
Cut two slits into the back of the muscle shirt and slide the arms through it.
Secure the circle to the square with zip ties where the shapes intersect.
Secure the hands and feet with zip ties. (Alternatively, put on the muscle shirt, and then ask a friend to secure the cardboard hands to the circle).
Get into the second pair of jeans.
Slide into the muscle shirt, if you are not already wearing it.
Have a friend put the belt ends through the jeans you are wearing, and buckle tight. This belt will now hold up the cardboard legs.
Hold the circle and square up with your arms stretched out at an angle, as in the picture of the Vitruvian man.
Hold the pose for as long as you can. The longer you hold it, the buffer you’ll become, just like the real Vitruvian Man.
Amazing! I love this costume. So lucky you still (and hopefully always) have a kid who is as into it as you are!
LOVE the "Black Hole" reference. I thought I was the only one who had a floating black hole in my home!