When Emma decided on a Harry Potter themed birthday party, the first thing she insisted on was that every guest was to have their own wand.
Luckily for me wands are pretty easy to make, and without much effort, or special craft supplies. Emma and I had a lot of fun making a range of Harry Potter style Wizard Wands.
They aren’t exact replicas of the wands in the film, but rather, they’re inspired by the wands we saw on our tour of the Harry Potter Studios in London. The original designs are quite varied and I can imagine that our DIY Harry Potter wands would fit right in.
The real ‘prop’ wands used in the making of the Harry Potter Movies
We did stray a little from some of the more austere designs by adding a few sparkly gems. After all, we needed to consider that these wands were to be used by a gaggle of nine year old girls, you can’t blame us for adding a little bit of bling.
Of course wands in the ‘real’ Wizarding World aren’t just made of wood, they have magical wand cores like Unicorn Hair, Dragon Heartstring or the most powerful of all, Phoenix feather. We are only amateur wand makers so I don’t expect we’ll produce a wand as powerful as the Elder Wand!
Even so, these DIY Harry Potter Wands are a fun project to make with your little witch or wizard.
Pop over and take a look at the photos from Emma’s Harry Potter Party. We had a wand presentation at Ollivander’s Wand Shop, and then the girls had a ton of fun running around and casting spells.
How to make your own Wizard Wand
You will need:
BASIC SUPPLIES
- Old bamboo chopsticks, thin dowels or twigs
- Hot glue gun and glue sticks
- Craft knife and/or sandpaper
- Paint in black, brown or your chosen colour
- Paint brush
- Shoe polish and soft cloth (not pictured)
OPTIONAL SUPPLIES
- Thin cord
- Wooden beads
- Decorative Gems
- Gum Nuts or Seed Pods
- Glitter paint or metallic paint
Caution: Hot glue can burn so please be careful. If you get hot glue on your skin run it under cold water immediately.
How to:
1. Select your wand base – In our case we are using old mismatched chopsticks, but thin dowels or even dried twigs from your garden will work just as well.
2. If your chopsticks have square ends, use a craft knife or sandpaper to round off any corners. Sand off any rough bits that may cause splinters.
3. Decide on your wand design. Will it have a handle, be gem encrusted or look more organic? We’ve made a variety of different styles inspired by Harry Potter wands from the movie, and our own imagination.
How to add a cord handle
4. Add a blob of hot glue to the end of you chopstick and lay cord down till firmly fixed. Add more glue up the stick and start winding the cord around and up the stick covering the starting tail of the cord.
5. Add hot glue in small amounts and winding the cord till you reach about a third of the way up the wand. Trim the cord and secure the end with some more hot glue.
Organic Wand
6. Glue a gum nut or small seed pod onto the end of your chopstick.
7. Carefully spiral a bead of hot glue about half way down the wand. Allow to cool before placing down on a surface.
Embellish
8. Make your wands more interesting by adding wooden beads or gems to the base of the handle. Secure firmly with hot glue.
Paint & Polish
Now comes the fun part that the kids can get involved with – Painting their Harry Potter wands.
9. Give each wand a couple of coats of paint, being careful not to cover any sparkly bits.
10. You can add a few coats of paint in different colours and wipe away the top darker layers while the paint is still wet to give a textured effect.
11. Once the paint is dry, use some shoe polish to give your wand a shiny protective coating.
12. Buff off the shoe polish gently to give it a soft lustre.
13. Another option for adding a little bit of extra extra sparkle is giving your wand a thin coating of glitter paint or metallic paint.
All done! Which one is your favourite?
How to display your Harry Potter wands
Because we created these wizard wands for Emma’s Harry Potter Birthday Party, to give to her party guests, I wanted a cool way to display them in the style of Ollivander’s Wand Shop.
Rather than packing away the wands in their own individual boxes, I lined a wooden breakfast tray with red felt and presented each wand with its own hand written label.
It was fun imagining what wand wood material and core each wand was made of, as well as it’s properties. We spent a long time working out which wand would suit each party guest remembering… “The wand chooses the wizard, Mr. Potter” – Mr Ollivander (Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone)
Oh, but do they work? Well, you’ll have to make your own to find out!
Time to test out your wand!
“EXPECTO PATRONUM”
Want to dabble in some dark magic? We made a Bellatrix Lestrange Wand and Bellatrix Costume
MORE HARRY POTTER CRAFT PROJECTS:
Are there different colors associated with the different wands? If so, do you know what they are?
Most wands (in the movies) are brown or black as they are made of wood. When making your own you can be as creative as you like.