Abbey Bread

Making Polystyrene Belgian Abbey Bread 

Another material we were taught to use for prop making is polystyrene and polyurethane, which is just a more compact version. The aim was to produce Belgian abbey bread from the polystyrene and cheese from the polyurethane to link with my project.

First of all it helps to have the image in front of you as a reference you can keep looking back to. Get a block of polystyrene roughly the size you want the prop and mark out the simple shape you want to cut out. To do this all you need to use a retractable knife.

To round the edges I just used these tools that looked like graters, and gave the polystyrene a more authentic bread shape, as well as grating the three lines on top where the dough would have been sliced before baking.

Once the shape has been carved out the next stage is to sand down the whole surface to smooth it out. 

As the polystyrene is easily breakable, and as we are making a prop, it needs to withstand being handled and used over again, it needs to be strengthened. I did this by mixing up pva with water and cutting up squares of muslin. Paint the pva mixture onto the bread; lay down one layer of muslin, and then paint over with another layer of pva. Do this all over, so when it dries it does harden up and becomes more solid.

Then I was able to paint it, as the audience isn't going to see it up close, it doesn't need to look identical to abbey bread, however it needs to be convincing from a distance.

Making Polyurethane Belgian Cheese 

The next material to learn to work with is polyurethane, and with this is chose to make a slice of Belgian Passendale cheese using pretty much the same method as the bread. 

Draw on simple shapes as a guide and cut out, this was a bit harder than before because of it’s a lot thicker.

I grated the edges and sanded for a smooth finish, although I like the texture the material naturally gave after being cut, it actually looked like cut cheese, so I didn’t think it was necessary to do a layer of pva and muslin on this prop.

 All that was left to do was paint it, using my research pictures as a guide. 

Et Voila ! two more props!