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Custom Sculpture & Sign Co.

127 Wampler St.
Nickelsville, VA 24271
276-479-0388 - Sign Shop
Hours are not fixed. Please call before you visit the shop.

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Finishing up this double sided sign made from weatherproof HDU sign foam. Scroll work bracket made by some friends at #heritagevirginiamills
16 ft. spruce stump carved in Lindley Park in Bozeman Montana. A team effort with my nephew Josiah Macica at #pineridgecarvings
Starting this 16 footer in Bozeman, Montana. Stay tuned…
Wait for it!!! I am spraying an activator onto a special iron paint. Within minutes, actual rust begins to form all over the surface of this epoxy resin sculpture making it look like a weathered, cast iron sculpture. Thanks for looking!!
This is half of a mold I made of a life-size bulldog. I will use the mold to make bulldog casts to sell. They will be cast in a weatherproof material similar to plaster, and then painted. Stay tuned for more on this project. Thanks for looking.
Working on a life-size elk sculpture with my son. This will be molded and cast as a cold cast bronze. Thanks for looking!
A pair of custom, replica table legs for a customer in New Hampshire. Thanks for looking!
Cuddly cubs!!
Making a complicated 3 part mold of this life-size bulldog… Stay tuned…
All kinds of bears around here…
Working on two climbing cubs, to be attached to a customer's tree stump in Syracuse, NY.
This life-size bulldog is carved out of 8 lb. density foam
Carving away on a bulldog face. Loving my #saburrtooth bits for carving this 8 lb. hdu foam.
A new venture. Some of you may know I’ve been experimenting with foam and resin sculptures for a few years. I have been using 3 lb. EPS foam for most projects. But, I have noticed if the sun is very strong, it can cause the foam to heat up and move slightly, or possibly shrink if extremely hot. This can leave small cavities underneath the epoxy shell. Or it can cause the epoxy to crack if the foam expands. So, I am trying out a new type of foam that should be much more stable. This is an 8 lb. density closed cell foam that comes in two liquid parts that you mix together and pour into a form. It expands 8 times its size within minutes. You have 45 seconds to mix. I simply made a form out of corrugated plastic sheeting from Home Depot and duct taped the outer joints of the form. I lined the inside with 3 mil plastic sheeting because the foam won’t stick to it. It took 3 gallons to fill a form for a life size sitting bulldog. That’s $40 a gallon. You essentially end up with a giant, custom solid block of 8 lb. HDU foam! This stuff is dense and carves like wood with no grain. You can order the foam if you google - ILL Street Composites. It holds detail and sands so easily, but wear a mask. Foam is not something you want to breathe! Work in an enclosed room to make clean up simple. Stay tuned for more progress on this project.
Making progress on these table leg replicas.
Working on a pair of replica table legs carved in white pine. She inherited plaster table legs from her Grandmother, but they are cracking. So, this way she can preserve the leg design and use them far into the future and pass them onto her grandchildren! The design is a fun, graceful wave form. It’s going to be a lot of fun to carve. Stay tuned!
This is a finished 7 ft. mailbox bear designed to be holding a mailbox. This is headed to central Virginia. A cub in a stump is getting cleaned up for a customer in Florida near Orlando. Thanks for looking and sharing!
7 ft. tall Momma bear and cub, mailbox holder for a customer in central Virginia. Next, the black bear colors get added to finish it off. Thanks for looking!
Please come and join us Friday evening and Saturday. We will have wood fired pizza Friday evening. Saturday we will have live craft demonstrations, make your own crafts for kids, live gospel music at 1 pm after the parade, great food and fellowship until evening. See you soon!
Carving some marina pilings in Old Saybrook, CT.
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Custom  Sculpture  &  Sign  Company

Custom Sculpture & Sign Company

Custom Sculpture, Carved Signs and Fine Crafts

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Giant 5′ Tall Bulldog!

Custom Sculpture & Sign Co. September 18, 2020 0 Comments

I was asked by the Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to create a huge bulldog as a surprise for the commander. We decided to make it from 3lb EPS foam with a weatherproof epoxy shell. It would be painted with a faux rust finish.

The foam block for this carving was humongous! The final dog was slated to be about 5 feet tall, 6 feet long, and 3 feet wide.

I roughed everything out, then refined the carving in preparation for the epoxy coat.

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Next, we applied the epoxy coat. The epoxy hardens within 10 minutes of mixing, so it took many, many small batches to coat the whole dog.

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Then we moved on to painting the rust coat…

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Once the rust was activated and a clear coat applied, we drove it up to Delaware in the bed of my truck. It created quite a stir on the road and at every gas station! Several times on the highway I noticed people tailgating me or craning their phones to get a picture.

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Miciah and the dog are having a word…

Our client also asked about having a miniature bulldog made, in a size that the commander could take home with him. My oldest son, Miciah, took this project over and carved the dog himself. This is the first piece Miciah has carved! He roughed out the dog’s body in foam, and then sculpted the head with epoxy clay, and painted it with special effects rust paint to match the bigger dog.

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Thanks for looking! If you have an idea for a custom pet memorial, head over to my contact page and get in touch!

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CategoriesBears & Land Animals, Bulldog, Dogs, Uncategorized
Tagsair force, air force art, air force logo, air force sculpture, amusement park art, amusement park artist, amusement park sculpture, bulldog, bulldog art, bulldog sculpture, custom bulldog art, custom bulldog sculpture, custom carved bulldog, custom dog logo, custom dog sculpture, custom logo carving, custom logo sculpture, custom pet memorial, custom pet sculpture, dog sculpture, dover air force base, foam sculpture, military art, military logo sculpture, military sculpture, modern masters metal effects, modern masters paint, slider
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