Make DIY Concrete Pumpkins (With a Fancy Twist)

Make DIY concrete pumpkins and add shimmery gold accents to dress up your tablescape or to decorate your porch this fall.

Do you even know how easy it is to make DIY concrete pumpkins?

If you are wondering what kind of pumpkin mold you use to make pumpkins, the answer is nylon stockings. Yep, that’s right, you can make DIY concrete pumpkins with pantyhose.

Sometimes you need a little bit of fancy in your life- or at least I do.

I tend to do everything casual, but this year I’m feeling like dressing things up a bit.

And so to add a little glamour to these rustic pumpkins, I used this amazingly shimmery gold paint that I love. The shimmery touch was the perfect way to combine rustic with fancy!

If you want to see another way to make a cement pumpkin, take a look at my lighted, Halloween Cement Jack O’Lantern. For that project, I used a plastic pumpkin pail as the mold.

And here’s a real live miniature pumpkin I carved. I used a stencil which is partly why it looks so cool!

This is a regular sized pumpkin with a carving of a cat, and 67 free cat carving patterns.

When painting these, the nice thing is that you can keep layering the paint to adjust.

And here’s a hint, use wet sandpaper to sand the concrete pumpkin if you really make a mistake.

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DIY Difficulty Level | Easy

Materials For Making DIY Concrete Pumpkins With A Fancy Twist

• White cement
• Disposable bowl
• Disposable cup
• Durable nitrile gloves– I like these because they are so durable, you can rinse and reuse and end up costing less in the long run
• Safety glasses
• Safety mask- silica rated
• Acrylic paints– blue, green, white, yellow and black* – these paints are the best I have used for mixing with cement. Other paints dry it out too much.
• Cotton string
• Hot glue gun
• White glue or Mod Podge
• Scissors
• Sisal rope
• Alcohol ink– green (Optional)
• Ground cinnamon
• Shimmery paints- green, pink, gold 
• Small, supple paintbrush – about ½” or ¾” wide
• Foam paintbrush
• Paint palette tray
• Dried moss
• A few small bowls

Tutorial Steps For DIY Concrete Pumpkins

Step 1. Prep The Stocking Mold

Cut a stocking about 6” above the foot seam and place it over a wide mouthed cup. This will make it much easier to get the concrete inside.

Next, cut six pieces of string around 15” long and one piece about 7”.

Lay the six longer pieces onto your work surface so they bisect each other -they should look like a pizza cut into 8 slices. (Are you sensing a pizza theme here?) 😂

Set the shorter string next to these- you will use this in Step 6 to tie the top of the stocking.

Step 2. Mix The Paint Colors For This DIY Concrete Pumpkin

Mix the paint colors together first. To get a sage color, you’ll want a base of green, a little bit of purple (or blue mixed with red) and some black.

Stir these together and add more on whatever color you need to make it more sage.

The black paint is what will help it have a grey undertone, but if you go too dark, you can add white.

Please note, the color in your bowl will be quite a bit lighter once mixed with the white cement, so adjust accordingly.

Step 3. Cast The Concrete

Mix the dry cement mix with water. Once mixed, add the paint and mix it well.

You are aiming for the consistency of pizza dough with no lumps. Scoop this up and drop it into the stocking that’s over the cup.

Step 4.  Mold The Concrete Into Shape

Remove the stocking from the cup and plop it on the work surface. You are going to make this into a round shape.

Just lift the stocking up and down until it’s generally shaped like a pumpkin, then tie the top and trim off any excess stocking- leaving about an inch.

Step 5. Create The Sections For The Concrete Pumpkin 

Place the concrete into the center of your pizza slice shaped string arrangement. The tied strings will create the sections for the pumpkin.

Tie the first two pieces of spring going across and up and down. Try to make these as even as you can. 

Next, tie the diagonals together. Be sure you are tying these tight enough that they create the grooved sections, but not too tight.

The pumpkin is going to try to flatten out while you are doing this. Just turn it on its side, after it’s tied together and roll it around once. This should pull it back up a bit so it’s less flat. 

Now set the concrete pumpkin aside for about an hour. *Set a timer so you don’t forget.

Though the cure time is 24 hours, you are doing this because you are going to remove the stocking and strings after the pumpkin has set -but before it cures.

If you don’t do this early, then you’ll be cursing my name for how difficult it is to remove the stocking and strings. I made that mistake with the first set I did. It was bad. 

The timing of an hour ends up working out because the concrete has set enough that it won’t crack and you can disrobe the pumpkin easily.

Just take care when you remove the stocking to not touch the concrete or it will leave a mark.

If you do touch it, just take a piece of stocking and tap the area you touched to bring back the texture.

Now let this cure for 24 hours.

Step 6. Paint The Concrete Pumpkin With Fancy, Shimmery Colors

Once the concrete is completely dry, you can paint it. Now you may be wondering why we colored the cement mix and now we are going to paint the concrete pumpkin green.

It’s because having the base color of a light green helps it look nicer when you add the shimmery paints.

The green shimmer paint will darken it a bit and give it some added depth. The gold makes it fancy!

To paint this, you’ll do a paint wash. It’s easiest if you have a palette type of tray for this. Take a drop or two of the green and place it in a palette section and add a little water.

In the next little tray section, add some of that watered down paint and water it down a bit more. This gives you two levels of a whitewash to play with. 

I used the more watered down paint on the edges and the less watered down paint in the middle of each section. 

Once you have the green the way you like it (hint- the pumpkin will dry lighter), then do the same with the gold.

I also painted a slightly watered down gold paint down the vertical grooves between the sections.

Step 7. Make The Stalk For The Cement Pumpkin

Wait for the pumpkin paint to dry, before making the stalk. In the mean time, take some dried moss and rub it together in your hands.

Keep crushing it together until you almost have powder. Put this into a small bowl and set it aside.

I created the stalk in two different ways because the color tone of the pinkish pumpkin didn’t really work with the cinnamon color.

The cinnamon trick I learned from Anderson and Grant.

Here are the two options.

Cinnamon colored stalk: Cut a piece of rope to about 7” long and lightly separate the six strand twists. Remove a few if you have a smaller pumpkin, to make it more proportionate.

Use your fingernail to pull the individual strands that little further apart so it’s not such a tight braid. 

Then at the bottom, fringe the strands so that they straighten.

Now take the glue gun and add some glue along the strands vertically inside the middle. Next, twist them together just a little and bend them into a stalk shape.

Pour a good amount of cinnamon into a bowl or onto a plate.

Brush the rope with white glue or Mod Podge and then dip it into the cinnamon and roll it around.

Once it’s covered, shake the excess off. 

Green stalk: Cut the sisal rope to about 7” and then separate those from each other and remove a few if you have a smaller pumpkin, to make it more proportionate.

Twist them in the opposite direction that they are twisted. This will straighten them out. 

Dip these into a glass of water and lay on your work surface, then add several drops of green alcohol ink to the palette tray.

Use the paint brush to color the strands. You may need to add several more drops of the alcohol ink because it dries really quickly. Let these dry before glueing.

Once the sisal is dry, use hot glue to glue through the middle – going vertically.

You only need a little glue, just enough to get the strands to gel together. Give these a twist and bend them into the shape of a stalk. 

Both: Add hot glue to the top center of this shimmery concrete pumpkin and place the bottom of the stalk there. As you place it, wrap it a little so it has a bit of a swoosh.

As soon as you glue the stalk, take pinches of the moss and sprinkle it on top around the base of the stalk.

The moss will stick pretty well to the glue that’s there and to the concrete.

Over time a little may fall off, but you can brush a tiny bit of glue onto the DIY concrete pumpkin and stalk base and let it stick.

Mine stuck well enough that I’m not bothered if a few pieces fall off.

For other awesome fall decor and crafts, take a look at 31 Amazing DIY Dollar Tree Crafts For Fall and these beautiful marbled Concrete Pillar Candle Holders.

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