How To Turn A Walnut Into A Man-Eating Plant

Watch the build video here!

In the final installment of our spooky plants series,  
our inspiration comes from the iconic Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors. If you haven't seen the movie or the stage production, you've probably seen some version of this prop. It's a popular Halloween decor project among DIY and craft enthusiasts!

This one makes use of a walnut shell for Audrey's carnivorous head. I have a tutorial on how to split a walnut in half here. You'll also need a small terracotta pot. If you want to age and distress a new pot, I've got step-by-step instructions on how to do that here.

If you're interested in checking out the haunted spider plant I made out of foam hair rollers, or the bleeding string of hearts, you can check out the articles at the linked text or watch the build video on my YouTube channel here!

In addition to the walnut shell and plant pot, you'll need  some polymer clay (I used Super Sculpey for this project), acrylic paint, a bit of armature or fencing wire, and other crafty bits you might already have. 

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Step 1: Using a walnut shell to create the plant's head.

Step 1:  Create the Walnut Jaws

Split and clean out the walnut shell. I created a small wire hinge to hold the jaws together. You can see how to do that here, but the hinge was probably overkill. You could hold the jaws in place with a wad of clay instead.

Stuff a thin layer of clay into the base of the walnut shell halves to smooth them out.

Step 2: Tiny pre-baked teeth made with white polymer clay.

Step 2: Pre-Bake Some Tiny Teeth

The impressive teeth of this carnivorous plant are deceptively easy. The trick is to pre-bake them before you install them into the jaws. 

If you have a bit of white clay to make them, this will save you a bit of tedious painting down the line.

Step 3: Putting down a "U" shaped snake of clay for the gums.

Step 3: Make Some Gums

You'll notice the insides of the mouth have magically turned to purple. At this point I remembered that I own purple polymer clay and I hate trying to paint inside tiny mouths, so I re-did Audrey II's palettes in purple. If you don't have coloured clay, that's fine. You can paint this bit later.

I also made the gums with a long snake of purple clay. I fit this on top of the edge of the walnut shell. (Do this for each of the top and bottom jaw.)

Use a tool or your finger to blend the seam on the inside of the mouth.

Step 5: Installing the pre-baked teeth by poking the base of the tooth into the gums.

Step 4: Install the Teeth

Push the base of the pre-baked teeth into the gums. If you have oven-bake clay adhesive, you can use a bit on the base of each tooth, but it's not necessary. Plus, if a monster tooth falls out later, it will just make your deadly plant look a little more ravaged!

Repeat the process for the second half of the walnut shell.

Step 5: Making a tongue.

Step 5: The Easiest Monster Tongue

Craft the easiest monster tongue you'll ever make by rolling out a snake of clay, tapering the ends and folding in half. If you need to, you can trim some length off of the chubby end. Again, I used coloured polymer clay because I had it on hand, but it's not necessary.

Give the tongue a bend or twist to give it some character and shove it into the back of the walnut jaws. You can use a small ball stylus or the rounded end of a paintbrush to stippple some texture onto the clay. Easiest creature tongue ever! You can watch the tongue making process in more detail in the build video.

Bake your project here in the polymer clay equivalent of saving your work.

Step 6: Lips and an armature wire stem have been added to the walnut.

Step 6: Create a Stem and Lips

Use some armature wire to create a stem for Audrey II's head. If you don't have armature wire, check out the fencing or gardening section of your local hardware store.  Fencing wire makes a great alternative to armature wire, and is often more affordable. Cheap-ass artist win!

The lips are two long snakes of clay, tapered at both ends. I gave them some texture by pressing the side of  a pointy tool into the clay to make some short vertical lines. If you want to see the process in more detail, please check out the build video.

Cover the stem in polymer clay and smooth it out. Again, you can watch exactly how I did mine in the build video. Give this assembly a bake to cure.

Step 7: Making some vines by wrapping lengths of armature wire in Sculpey.

Step 7:  Make Some Vine Tentacles

Cover some armature wire in polymer clay to make some viny tentacles.  Add as much detail as you want here. I noticed some leafy sheath-thingies on the reference images from the Little Shop of Horrors movie. (You can check out the reference images I used for this and all my projects on Pinterest.) I added these by smoothing some teardrop-shaped bits of polymer clay into the vine.

The masking tape you see on the wire is just my indicator of how long I want the vines to be. I just eyeballed this.

Bake the the vines to cure.

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Step 8: Making the man-eating plant's leaves.

Step 8: Leaves

Make three larger leaves. I gave mine some realistic texture by pressing polymer clay into a homemade leaf-texture mat. 

​There's more detail on how I made the texture mat in the build video.

Bake these to cure. This is the final step in creating the components of our man-eating plant. Now we can get onto paint and assembly. This is where Audrey II will really start to come alive!

Step 9: Dry-brushing colour onto a dark purple base coat.

Step 9:  Prime and Paint

You can now paint the components of your scupture with any paint technique you like!

I gave all of the components two coats of a dark purple base colour. (Of course, I didn't base coat the areas inside the mouth that I made with coloured clay.)

I used a dry-brushing paint technique to slowly build up layers of colour and really emphasize all of the texture!

I especially love how the drybrushing emphasizes the natural texture of the walnut.

Step 10: Hot-gluing the sculpture's components into the plant pot.

Step 10: Assembly

When the paint has dried, hot-glue the components into the plant pot.

I used a scrap of foam floor mat to make the "soil" for the plant. I was able to hide some rocks under the foam to make sure that the sculpture wasn't top-heavy. A top-heavy sculpture is easy to accidentally knock over, and thereby more likely to break!

Step 11: Adding some resin drool into Audrey's mouth.

Step 11: Finishing Touches

I recommend using some coffee grounds or craft moss to cover the foam used in Step 10. Put down a flood of hot glue and sprinkle a generous amount of coffee or moss crumbs on top. Tip out the excess when the glue has cured.

I used some resin to add some thick, glossy, venomous drool inside Audrey's mouth. If you don't like working with resin, use a high-gloss polymer clay compatible clear coat instead.

Finished Man-Eating Plant Polymer Clay Sculpture that Started with a Walnut.

And here she is finished! It's hard to believe she started as a walnut, isn't it?!?

This is my personal favourite of the spooky plant series. If you want to watch each step of this project in detail, please check out the build video on my YouTube channel below.

There's articles on the other two plants in the series you might be interested in. I made a haunted spider plant out of foam hair rollers, and a bleeding string of hearts that might inspire you to add to your own DIY spooky plants collection for Halloween decor - or just for an everyday witchy plant aesthetic.

If you give this project a try, it would make my day if you’d share it with me. I’m @JaneSawyerMakes on TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, Reddit, Threads,  and Twitter (X). Please share and pin this article!

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