HOW TO MAKE CARPET TUBE TENT/BOOTH

The following booths using carpet tubes and boards were designed by Rod Moyer at Calvary Baptist Church, Reading, PA. They are  inexpensive, since you can usually get carpet tubes for free from carpet shops/suppliers. 

Each booth was designed to be 10' long by 8' wide. It is higher in the back than the front, it will give the illusion of a peaked tent or roof.   The back columns are 7', the second set at 6'6,"the third at 6' and the opening columns at 5'5" tall. The four columns on each side were set into a lath frame, with screws inserted into both sides for stability. An 8' lath strip at the back holds the two sides in place.  You can see how the carpet tubes fit into the boards in the pictures above and below. 

To anchor the tops of each side, carpet tubes were split in half lengthwise and fastened that at the top of each column. Then the additional halved carpet tubes were he's notched out to use as trusses/crosspieces.

Below is a close up showing how the roofing fits together. Of course, the roofing is on longer tubes...I believe this was just an example/trial piece.

Below you can see it put together and draped with sheets.

(More decorative draping was added later). 

And here we see the tents with decorative draping.

How to Make Faux Rock Walls

If you need a "rock wall" for theatrical performances, Vacation Bible School, a parade float, Easter pageant, school play, etc, there are many options for you to choose from. "Rock" can be made from a variety of materials, and it's amazing how realistic of a stone wall you can make without an ounce of real stone. Below you will find methods for making faux rock wall at various levels of realism, cost, and sturdiness.

(The Rock wall photo in this post is from a VBS set of First Baptist Church in Tuscola, TX. It's made by the Crumpled Paper Rock Wall method you'll find in the posts below.)

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Rock Wall: Foam Board

Foam Board Rock Wall by Brian McGuire from Parkview Baptist Church in Monroe, LA.

To make a rock wall like the one pictured you cut "rocks" out of foam board and attach them to a larger sheet of foam board or wood (possibly even sturdy cardboard), and then paint them in shades of gray or brown.

Some paints, especially spray paints, will eat away at foam, so you will want to test your paint out before applying to a large area. However, you can also use this property to make foam board rock without having to do any cutting or gluing  You can paint around where you want rocks to be, which creates a grout like indentation when the paint eats away at the rock. Then you can paint the rocks that are left with non-eroding paint. There are some significant safety and environmental concerns to using this method though. Make sure to be in a well ventilated place when you do this, as the fumes can be harmful. Wearing a mask is suggested.

Foam board too expensive? You can use packaging foam, old or broken foam coolers, etc. Broken up, painted, and attached to a backing they can look great!

While the example above is fairly simple, you can get incredibly detailed with foam board rock by carving the foam...just check out the example below.

Picture provided by Hugs, Kisses, and Snot

You can find some more excellent pictures, as well as more detail on painting and carving techniques for this type of "stone" wall here. There's also step by step pictures of an amazing wall built for an Easter set here.

See All Rock Wall Ideas Here

Making a Rock Wall With Crumpled Paper

The rock wall above was created for Nazareth VBS at the First Baptist Church in Tuscola, TX.

It's amazing to think that the wall above was made with just paper, paint, and cardboard. The stones were made by cutting out different rounded shapes from scrap paper, crumpling them up, unfolding them, and spraying them with stone paint, gray paint and black paint. These were then stapled into the cardboard structure (made from refrigerator boxes!)

Photo by Kelly Moreland

Another church, for Rome VBS, made this stone wall with rectangular crumpled paper "bricks" with painted foam board stones for accents.

See All Rock Wall Ideas Here

Make a Rock Wall With Printed Paper or Plastic Party Rolls

This rock wall was created for Nazareth VBS at Dayspring Baptist Church in Waco, TX.

You can make a rock wall using commercial party paper, corrugated paper, or plastic party sheets. The house above is made this with party paper (though the rock around the door is foam board, made with the spray paint grout method described in a previous Rock Wall post). This is probably the quickest and easiest way to make a wall, though less three dimensional than some other methods. You can see some more pictures of party paper wall in use here.

Below are some examples of rock wall papers you can purchase (click on the image to see them on Amazon).  The first one listed is the one we used to make the house pictured above.

Basic Party Papers

 

Corrugated Party Papers

Corrugated papers are sturdier, similar to cardboard.  These need less support than the regular party papers pictured above.

Plastic Party Rolls

These plastic sheets are especially useful if you need a rock wall that can get wet.  The ones below even have a turret border you can add, and a ground floor (though unfortunately they don't sell the dirt by itself, without the wall, which would be nice for covering a larger area). 

They also have some other matching accessories which could be useful...

Vinyl Peel and Stick Wallpapers
While these are more expensive than party papers or plastic sheets, they seem simple to use, and like they would  hold up better to reuse than plastic sheets (though I haven't personally used these, so I can't vouch from experience for that).

Wallpaper Murals

Sometimes you want something more permanent   Wall murals are a bit pricey for something like VBS, but if you want to decorate a room with a rock wall for the long term, not just a short event, the extra cost of buying actual wallpaper might be worth it.  Here are some examples or rock wallpaper murals.

See All Rock Wall Ideas Here

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