DIY Vintage Clown Pumpkins

Learn how to create vintage clown pumpkins using paper and paint! A fun alternative to carving pumpkins!

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Hello Crafty Friends! Today I’m excited to share these fun DIY vintage clown pumpkins with you. These clown pumpkins are a fun way to decorate pumpkin without carving. They are both spooky and playful and you only need paper and paint to create them!

For these clown pumpkins, I recommend using white pumpkins in various sizes. Vintage clowns used white makeup and wore costumes in all shapes and sizes. Can’t find white pumpkins? Use white acrylic paint to turn an orange pumpkin white.

All of the clown accessories are made from scrapbook paper including quirky hats, ruffs and bow ties. The clown faces can be painted on with acrylic paint.

How to Make Clown Pumpkins

Supplies Needed

White/Cream Pumpkins -real or fake. I used two 9″ cream pumpkins and a 6.5″ cream pumpkin.
Orange and Black Acrylic Paint
Cardstock in orange, black and white plus some fun patterns like stripes and polkadots
Black buttons
Orange and White Yarn or Pom Poms
Scissors, tape, hot glue
Ribbon

Clown Pumpkin Paper Hats

To create the clown accessories like the hats, I used paper which was both economical and had the vintage feel I was going for. I made things up as I went trying to figure out new ways to manipulate the paper to look like ruffs and bows.

For the hats I cut a half circle and used it to form a cone, using tape to secure it. I added a yarn pom-pom to the top and buttons down the front. Pleating a thin strip of paper worked well to add to the bottom of the hat using hot glue. Use black buttons and paper to decorate the hats and add pattern and color.

You can check out my paper hat tutorial for more details on creating a cone-style hat from paper plus a guide for making a pom pom by hand!

Clown Pumpkin Paper Ruffs

Two of my clowns have paper ruffs created two different ways. The first with accordion folded paper. I cut strips of black and orange polka-dot paper, then accordion folded them to create a large circle ruff the pumpkin could sit inside of.

For the second pumpkin’s ruff, I created using small loops of paper. I cut a large circle from cardstock and cut strips of paper from striped paper and polka dot orange paper. I tape the strips of paper around the cardstock circle, looping the strips of paper to create a cute looped ruff. The loops of paper were attached using tape in two circles around the ruff. When finished, the pumpkin head could sit right inside.

Painting the Clown Faces

Once I had the paper accessories created, I painted clown faces on the front of the pumpkins using orange and black acrylic paint. Search online for old pictures of vintage clowns for ideas on how they did their face paint and makeup.

Assembling the Clown Pumpkins

After the faces are painted, add the paper accessories you created. I chose not to glue my paper accessories onto the white pumpkins so I could reuse the pumpkins at Thanksgiving. Since the clown faces are only painted on one side of the pumpkin they can easily be hidden if the pumpkins are placed against a wall. If you plan to keep these pumpkins just for Halloween, use hot glue to adhere the paper accessories to each pumpkin.

To vary the height of the pumpkins and create a Halloween display, turn a planter over and set one of the clown pumpkins on top. I did this with one of my pumpkins and added a large exaggerated collar and tie made from paper.