# Facade Construction How-To



## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

This is an abbreviated version of how I built my facade. A few steps were left out along the way photographically because (a) I wasn't actually planning on making a how-to but rather just documenting the major steps along the way and (b) when push came to shove time-wise I needed to haul ass to complete it and get on to decorating my yard!

I started off with an idea I drew up last year of what I wanted to build. While I soon realized it couldn't be fully realized (the cryptkeeper's damn flower garden got in the way) I figured I could get the main components done.










And an aerial view of what I thought could be achieved:










You can see in the second picture the flying buttresses I still plan on making next year, but the walls that extend back to the house and then the parts that cover the porch to the right and the windows to the left have to be abandoned for the aforementioned flower gardens.

Doesn't she realize this is Halloween we're talking about?!


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

Once I decided to begin, I knew it would have to be modular in nature both for storage and for ease in construction. I build this stuff alone and I needed to be able to handle all the parts by myself. So whereas a lot of people build using 4x8 panels, that would be bulky for me to maneuver so I went with 2x8 panels. Since they're wood frames covered in rigid foam insulation, they're super-light.

That is good for moving around, but a slight problem when it comes to wind as I found out during construction when having skinned the gable a gust of wind caused it to become a parasail, which then created a new design change that you'll see in the later pictures.

But the facade began with the front pieces. Since it was to be modular, I started with the two "tower" sides, the gable top, and the archway. All four pieces would be joined together with bolts and nuts (why do we always say nuts-and-bolts when it's the bolts that are the key component in that phrase?) rather than screws because I was worried about the wood wearing down over time and the threads not gripping as tightly. I also figured the bolts would draw the structure together more tightly.










The same structure, but with the archway piece in place.










It was simpler to build the archway separately rather than trying to shape it in between the towers, plus I knew I wanted the peak to be 4 ft. about the towers for a total of 12 ft. high.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

Because I wanted the structure to be freestanding, as well as provide some design possibilities in the future (drop panels? scare spots?) I built the walls that run back from the archway, and which is why I call the sides the "towers."










These, however, are screwed into the frame of the facade only because there's one short face of wood butting up against a long face and that would have posed problems in drilling a hole through them. And should the screw holes wear out, I can simply move the screws up or down an inch or two.

The panels are screwed in in three places, top, bottom, and middle. I should also probably mention at this point that all the wood is 5/4 lumber, meanings it's a full inch thick.

Most people use 1x material (usually 1x3s), but Lowe's in my area carries the 5/4 lumber and since it's only a couple of pennies more than they 1x material I figured it would provide additional strength and surface area for screwing where needed while not taking up extra space or adding weight like a 2x4 would.

Also, since this is a facade and not the wall panels of a walk-thru haunt, I'm not worried about kids crashing into it and breaking it. In such a situation, 2x4's and wood paneling would be the better option.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

Next came the skinning portion of it where I applied the 1" thick rigid foam insulation. I didn't want to just screw it in since I was afraid it would pull through, and the plastic discs that the Davis's recommend from a company called Demand Products were a little pricey: 500 discs for about $35 to upwards of around $60 or so for 1,000 discs.

I went to Home Depot and found they had roofing nails with plastic orange discs attached to them, which I figure is used for holding down roofing paper, but I thought it would serve my needs here. So throughout these photos you'll see these orange circles all over the foam.










And they did the job, basically, as they provided a wider gripping surface for the screws to hold the foam to the wood. For about $10 or so for a one pound box it was a cheaper solution. The problem was if I was a little too aggressive in screwing them down, they'd pop through the cap. I then recalled that Haunt It Yourself Productions used fender washers so another trip to HD got me a 1-lb. box of fender washers cheaper still ($5 or so) and it did an even better job.

So although the photos show the orange caps, as I was carving the bricks into the panels later on I ended up swapping out the roofing caps for the fender washers and it is an even better solution that I don't ever have to worry about breaking. It provides a wider surface for gripping the foam and the screw won't ever pull through, at least not in my lifetime. 

So I began skinning the gable, clamping the foam in place, marking out the cut lines, and then taking it down, cutting it, and screwing it in place.




























It's important that the insulation be installed while the frame is together so you can be sure it all lines up and the ends of the panels are covered where they need to be. Also, later on when laying out the brick work pattern, you'll be able to make sure all your lines line up and wrap around the corners appropriately.

This was also the point where the facade turned into a sail when the wind grabbed it and sent it hurling into the cauldron of my cauldron creep, smashing it. I knew then I'd need another solution to having it stand. I thought the towers might give it enough stability alone to make it freestanding, but that was not to be.

That piece of plywood you see sticking out in the last photo gave me the idea of how to proceed. While my initial plan called for buttresses to the side, that plywood had actually held the facade sturdily during some good winds while working on it so I figured what if I had a buttress sticking out front to keep it from toppling, just like that plywood did? And after some design considerations -- a narrow "wall" like the plywood (though slightly thicker), for example, positioned either to the outside edge, the inside edge, or right in the middle -- I ultimately decided for something slightly different.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

I opted for a support structure that would look like this:










But since I needed to really serve a support purpose and not just deflect rainwater from the base of the structure, I had to bulk mine out a bit, like this:










Here again, though, I had to think of storage so they couldn't be permanently affixed to the towers, but rather are removable just like all the other pieces, which I'll show in a minute.

Because they are support pieces I wanted to make sure they were going to be extra sturdy so each box -- which Joiseygal lovingly described as looking like a washer and dryer on my facade -- has a plywood bottom and back. They're still relatively light, but a helluva lot stronger and it allowed me a chance to better affix them to the towers.

I ended up cutting away the lower portion of the foam insulation where the boxes would attach and placed some 1x3's flat around the opening that created. I then drilled through the plywood backing and into those flat pieces of wood, and was able to bolt them onto the towers.



















It can be easily accessed from the back of the tower, which is not skinned over with insulation, but is instead covered in landscape fabric that is stapled over the opening. When the facade is being constructed, I attach the boxes to the tower faces first and then build everything else off of that.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

These boxes were skinned as well and a 2" piece of pink foam I had on hand was added as a stone like topper for them.










While at this point I thought it gave the structure a more sphinx-like appearance and perhaps they could have been scaled down a bit, since they are for support to keep the facade from toppling over in a wind, sometimes you have to give up a design element. In the end, after detailing, I don't think they look too out of proportion to everything else.

With all the insulation attached, next came laying out the grout lines of the brick. I used a brick size that was generally 4"x4"x8" in size. Real bricks are around 3-5/8" today, and I don't think there was a standardized size back in the day, so I went with what looked good to me and wouldn't consumer all my time carving (though in the end it did anyway).

This is one of those steps where I didn't take pictures, but what I did was starting on one side I laid out the measurements of the bricks using a "story stick." Essentially that's a length of wood that lays out all the measurements you'll need with little tick marks and then you can apply that anywhere on the structure and -- theoretically anyway -- everything will line up. It needed a little adjusting, but I then snapped chalk lines across the face and simply used a 4' level on the small panels and laid out the brick work. I then went over all the lines with a black market.

You can see it here in this photo where I'm trying to decide on an archway design:










FWIW, the other design option was a rounded arch that would be built up using pipe insulation. This is what that looked like (sans the pipe insulation).










I had planned on putting columns on either side, but I also knew time was getting very tight and I'd want the columns removable too and that would entail a crap-ton of extra work so I nixed the rounded arch for the carved brick. I think I like that design element better anyway.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

In the step above, you can see a lattice arch in one of the photos. Here's another view from the back:










Because I didn't want it to appear that the walls were only 1" thick, I wanted to create something of a tunnel effect and debated about the best way to achieve this. I though of using 1/4" foam and trying to form it into shape, but ultimately decided on using the lattice.

This gives me a couple of design options, such as it being removable (naturally) but also being able to hang vines or moss from it as well as allowing me to install lighting behind the facade and have it shine down through the lattice to create some interesting, and hopefully, creepy patterns. The lattice was cut 2' wide to match the depth of the towers, painted black, and attacked to 2 piece of lumber that are screwed into the towers just above the foam insulation. Since the width of the archway is 4', I made the lattice about 5' long which allowed it to curve, providing the tunnel appearance.

Also just visible at the top of that picture is a piece of bracing I added. It's an 8' piece of 1x that spans the entire length of the facade from tower end to tower end. It is screwed into each spot it crosses over wood to provide extra rigidity. Not shown is on each tower back where the ends are open, I added two pieces of bracing to each tower side. That way it prevents the back of the towers from widening out and again provides more structural rigidity.

Another step not recorded was the actual carving process. Once the grout lines were laid out, the entire facade was dismantled for easier carving. It's when I also replaced the orange caps with the fender washers.

On each section I used a wood-burning tool and carved out the lines. I tried using a Dremel tool for that, but I've never quite gotten the knack of doing so, so I used the melting technique. After three passes it was at a good, deep depth.

Once completed, I didn't want the stones to look new, but rather worn down with age, so I took a wire brush -- one like you'd use to clean car battery terminals -- and cut the wooden handle off so that it fit into the palm of my hand. This made it far more maneuverable when doing the short grout lines as I was finding the longer handle kept dinging the bricks.

In long pulling motions holding the brush at about a 45-degree angle, I ran it along the scored grout lines. After some practice, I found that three pulls on the brush wore down the brick to just the right aged look. I then flipped the brush to the other hand and did the same on the other side of the grout line.

You're essentially wearing down the grout line in a V-pattern so first you drag the brush on one side, then on the other. This was the most time consuming part of the whole process and took nearly a week alone to complete, working a couple of hours on each section. But I thought the result looked pretty sharp.










Here you can see the fender washers have replaced the plastic caps and on the gable you cna see the design elements added. The pipe insulation around the crucifix "window" was the same sort of thing I was going to do with the archway, and had I had more space to make the archway that same gothic shape as opposed to round (and had more time to do so), that's what I had originally planned.

You can also see that the foam between the arch and the gable has been notched out. I did this to help hide the seam line between the two pieces (the tops of the towers are like this as well). I figured a straight line would stand out like a sore thumb, whereas if it was notched -- coupled with the brick work -- it would fool the eye a bit.

Generally it was successful but would have been even more so had I realized initially that I had glued and screwed a 3/4" piece of insulation to the arch piece, whereas everything else was 1" thick. LOL! Still, all in all, it appears fairly well hidden even up close and in person.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

And now we're hurrying to the end, just as I was with the project.

Once everything was carved, it was time to paint it all. I started with the back of it because I wanted it to be unobtrusive to the eye when the kids returned through the facade after coming to the door. Nothing like a bit of blue foam and wood supports to dissolve the illusion.

So I painted the back black and here I recommend using a compressor and sprayer. I started off doing it with a brush and it was taking forever, and then I remembered I had a sprayer to go with my compressor and in about 15-20 minutes or so all the pieces were painted. Of course, a storm blew in that night and washed away a good portion of the paint I had just applied so I had to do it all again the next day, but then once it dried it was fine.

On the front side I sprayed two coats of a buff color base. This was the color I knew would be my grout lines. I didn't want to go with the typical black or gray stone facade, but wanted to have an aged brick look to it and some photos I've seen shows grout is really a light color not a dark one that we normally associate with do these walls.

Once the base coat dried, it was time to paint the bricks. I thought this was going to be an arduous task, but it turned out to be the quickest and easiest step.

Using a regular household sponge I bought at the dollar store, I filled the pan with the brick colored paint and holding the sponge flat sat it on top of the paint. I lifted the sponge up and dabbed it off slightly and then laid the sponge on top of the brick I wanted to paint.

You don't wipe with the sponge but rather place, apply a little pressure, and lift. Because the sponge was a little smaller than the size of my brick I had to do each brick a couple of times, but it's taking me far longer to describe the process than to actually do it. Within an hour I had the entire brick work done.










When the brick color was done, I noticed in pictures of old brick buildings that the bricks are not all one uniform color, but rather there's a smattering of colors throughout. So using the same technique I just described, I added a few brown colored bricks to the panels and then mixed that brown with a little bit of orange to create a "burnt umber" sort of color and added a few of them as well.

When they were all dried I then used my sprayer again and coated the entire facade with decker sealer. The paints I used weren't exterior grade, but rather whatever I had on hand. While they will hold up in the rain (and snow!) for awhile, adding the deck sealer helps prolong how long they last.

Each year, as a matter of fact, I take all my props out and give them a coat of deck sealer, just like you would a fence, so next year I'll apply another coat to the facade too.

At this point, it was only necessary to wait for the facade to dry before putting it together in place. Because my front yard is slightly sloping, I had to level it with some bricks. They will be covered up with an addition fascia board I'll trim it out with but otherwise it you're ready to start haunting with it!










And a night shot!


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## BioHazardCustoms (Aug 5, 2009)

Very nice! This was a thorough tutorial, and I actually learned a few tricks while reading it. Thanks, Rich!


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## Jack Mac (Nov 28, 2012)

That turned out great! Looks like the real deal. Thanks for posting this how-to, lots of good tips.


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## [email protected] (Aug 25, 2012)

Those bricks are so realistic. Great job!


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## SCEYEDOC (Aug 12, 2007)

Thanks for sharing the pics and tutorial. You have certainly upped the ante around here. Quite impressive.


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## Riff_JunkieSFR (Jul 11, 2011)

Thats awesome! Thanks for the how-to, there is alot of great info there.


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## Lunatic (Oct 3, 2006)

Dang GC, you've been busy!
That turned out fantastic!
I like the details and that it's free standing.
Great job on it!


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## nimblemonkey (Aug 21, 2011)

I'm in awe- and the tutorial was exactly the right amount of info- not too long-winded with a enough detail and pictures to describe the process. This will help me next year when I do a monster lab walk-through. Thanks.


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## Kelly_A (Sep 24, 2013)

Outstanding job, thanks for the tutorial!


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## MotelSixx (Sep 27, 2008)

Excellent work.


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## GhoulishCop (Sep 25, 2009)

Thanks guys. I should note that while it is freestanding, we get some pretty strong wind gusts through the month of October and I was still worried -- even after the addition of the buttresses to the front -- that it might move or topple (I'm a bit of a worrywart like that; it's unlikely to happen, but I prefer being safe than sorry).

My original plan was to take a 2x4 and run it from the peak of the gable back to the roof of my porch and screw it in to help stabilize it. I figured that way it wouldn't move. Unfortunately, math is not a strong point of mine apparently, because I thought I had measured the height of the gutter as being 11 ft. and with the gable at 12 ft. I'd be able to reach the roof with the beam. Nah-uh.

The height of the gable is actually perfectly aligned with the height of the gutter, meaning I couldn't tie it into the house. So I opted for Plan B, which is actually the better one (particularly if you listened to the cryptkeeper bitchin' at me about screwing anything into the roof!).

I took a suggestion from [email protected] who recommended getting dog run stakes -- those big, screw-like devices you screw into the ground and tie a dog leash to -- and wires the facade to them. So I bolted the cable to either side of the facade and then screwed the stake into the ground and tied it off. Now the facade is stable in both directions.










As I said, it's probably overkill and unnecessary, but after having it topple over once and smashing a prop I'm in no mood to have it fall over on some kid on Halloween night. If we got another Hurricane Sandy, yeah, it might not withstand that, but otherwise I feel much relieved knowing this is fairly secure.

Rich


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## Uruk-Hai (Nov 4, 2006)

Wow! Looks GREAT!! Very realistic! I've been stuck on how to continue my mausoleum facade and will give the photos of your framework and contraction much study. I think it will really help a lot. Thanks!


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## ramath (Jan 24, 2013)

bro ive got to say this did turn out great and it will be fun to see how you add to it down the road, on a side note ive also got to say a big thank you to you on the tip of using those plastic washers,, there a heck of a lot cheaper in the long run than using fender washers like I was ,,, am using them on the new panels im building now


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## Dead Things (Apr 4, 2009)

Beautiful job, Rich. Looks amazing, very realistic. Great tutorial as well. This is exactly the type of thing I need for my garage exit. I will studying this in depth.
"the cryptkeeper's damn flower garden", LOL. Damn those cryptkeepers and their flowery ways!


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## CreeepyCathy (Mar 28, 2009)

WOW! Best façade ever! Stealing some of your build ideas!!


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## fontgeek (Jul 24, 2006)

This looks great!
Very nicely done too, that lattice also allows you to plant speakers around the opening without exposure to busy hands.
The only thing I would consider doing differently is maybe use forced perspective on the bricks. That is, have them and the grout lines get smaller and smaller as they go up. This fools the eye/mind into seeing the structure as being taller than it truly is.
I'll be curious to see how the whole thing holds up through storage and reconstruction.
Again, well done.


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## stagehand1975 (Feb 22, 2010)

Here is a tip to keep it from going anywhere. When you put it back together next year. Screw plywood to the bottom of the towers and after yu have it in place. Put bricks, or backs of dirt or mulch in the bottom of the towers on top of the plywood


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## kauldron (Oct 17, 2011)

Just found this thread and all I can say is WOW!! I have been trying to think of a way to redesign the wall panels at my haunt and I think you solved that for me. Great job.


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## Lord Homicide (May 11, 2012)

GhoulishCop said:


> I went to Home Depot and found they had roofing nails with plastic orange discs attached to them, which I figure is used for holding down roofing paper, but I thought it would serve my needs here. So throughout these photos you'll see these orange circles all over the foam.


Good use of shanks Rich. That type of nail, rim shank, is used when when the possibility of backing out can occur. Those make pallets hard as hell to demo with a hammer.


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## theundeadofnight (Aug 14, 2011)

Impressive construction . Looks fantastic . I like the extra effort you put in to make it safe .


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## Abunai (Oct 28, 2007)

Very impressive. 
Nice job.


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## smootah (Mar 23, 2014)

Wow! Talk about vision - you're a true artist.


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## ActionJax (Dec 21, 2011)

I've gotta say that it turned out GREAT! The faux brick work is "dead" on!


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