Awesome DIY Groot Costume from Guardians of the Galaxy

This year i wanted to do something big… and what’s bigger than Groot? Hours after inception of this wonderful idea i was at the hardware store buying copious amounts of insulation foam (I’m talking as much as I could physically carry!)

Once I got home I began digging through my drawers for some sacrificial pants and a top to start building on. For Groot’s height I used an old pair of drywall stilts (free!). Now, these old stilts were a little too tall as my head touched an 8″ ceiling. I put them on the Chop saw, cut them to a more reasonable height and bolted the pieces back together.

Once I had the height set, I bribed my fiance to coat me in duct tape (it was toasty in there) in order to make a “dummy” of my approximate size. I dressed up my dummy in my sacrificial clothes and got to work.

I started hot gluing the foam in random patterns to my base clothes until i had a large tree like figure. The plates on top as well as his mask were carved out of foam floor tiles. All of the details were carved using a sanding bit and a rotary tool. For the body I just made random wavy designs down each root to add texture. I then painted it using various shades of brown and finished it off with some greens for moss.

To add the final painting step I used a cheap airbrush to enhance the cut outs and added shading to give it more depth.. this really helped make it pop!

For the final touches, I hot glued on some more moss into random cracks… Groot is a tree after all!

What did I learn from all this? Everyone seems to love Groot! I must have been in hundreds of photos last night. It will be fun to see them pop up! Also, wearing a suit made of insulation foam is HOT! Be sure to make frequent breaks outside to cool off.

Have fun and happy Halloween!

-Groot

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