How to Make a Cute Polymer Clay Halloween Cane

Learn how to make a cute polymer clay Halloween cane in this post.

Though daytime temperatures are still hot, the mornings have been refreshingly cool lately—a sure sign that spooky season is just around the corner. Now is the perfect time to start crafting for Halloween! I designed this cute polymer clay Halloween cane with my granddaughter in mind. She’s a bit of a girly girl, so I chose an unconventional color scheme for a fun twist.

I kept the pattern on the larger side, which makes it less ideal for jewelry. Instead, I plan to use my cane to cover a candy container. However, the individual components of the design would make adorable Halloween studs. So, if you’re not looking to create a full, large-patterned cane, feel free to focus on your favorite elements and craft them individually.

This post doesn’t include specific color recipes, as I used scrap clay to create my version of the cute polymer clay Halloween cane. My cane ended up being a bit larger than needed, so I’ve provided an estimate of the clay amounts for the skull and ghost designs. If you want to create a smaller cane, simply adjust your quantities accordingly.

One important tip: If you’re mixing clay without a set color recipe, make sure you have plenty of your background color ready. Even if you think you have enough, it’s always a good idea to mix a little more just in case. If you have a kitchen scale, weigh the three design components together and multiply that number by two. Then, mix enough background clay to match that total. Using this method, I had plenty of clay to pack my cane properly and avoided the stress of running out mid-project. Trust me—it’s tough to match the exact color again without a recipe.

No kitchen scale? No problem! You can estimate the amount of clay needed by rolling it out into sheets and stacking them to roughly match the packed dimensions of your cane.

Ready to make your own cute polymer clay Halloween cane? Let’s get started!

Tools & Materials

Non-porous work surface — I work on either glazed tile or glass
Pasta machine dedicated to polymer clay use — I use an Atlas 180 and will refer to the settings I use on my machine. If you don’t have a pasta machine an acrylic roller and some playing cards will do in a pinch, it’ll just take a little more work.
Polymer clay — with the exception of white & black clay I raided my scrap bins for this cane
Sharp polymer clay blade
Knitting needle — or another small, round tool to smooth joins between pieces
Round micro cutter — the one I used is about 3/8”

Directions | Cute Polymer Clay Halloween Cane

The Skull

Condition the clay you’ve chosen to use for the skull. I used about 0.75 ounce for mine and by the end I had more cane than I really wanted. Use less clay than I did if you want a smaller cane.
Finish by folding the clay into a narrow strip about 1” wide and sheeting it on a medium setting (no.3 on my Atlas.) Roll the clay into a cylinder.
Press down on the cylinder to squash it slightly into an oval shape.
Using a sharp blade cut straight down through the middle of the cylinder at the widest part.
Reassemble the cylinder and mark where the eyes will go. Alternatively, mark the eyes first and then cut through them (which is what I should have done in the first place.)
Using the eye marks as a guide, cut through the clay with a round micro cutter.
Roll out a snake of black clay to the same diameter as the eye cutouts and put in place. Trim the black clay flush with the front and back of the the cylinder and reassemble.
Cut another slice off the bottom portion of the skull for the nose. Cut out a small triangle using a sharp blade or craft knife.
Use a knitting needle or other blunt tool to round out the top point of the triangle.

finishing steps for the polymer clay skull cane

Place a small black triangle of clay in the nose hole.
Use a dotting stylus, needle tool, or other thin tool to make a small depression at the bottom of the black triangle.
Place a thin snake of your main color in the depression.
Use the knitting needle to make a depression in the bottom part of the cylinder to accommodate the nose.
Reassemble the cylinder.
Roll out a snake of clay for the teeth and flatten slightly to elongate them. Cut three pieces for the teeth.
Put the teeth in place and place a thin piece of clay along both outside teeth. Use a knitting needle to smooth the join between the skull and the teeth.
Sheet a piece of black clay on a thinner setting—I used no.7—and wrap it around the skull.
Use a needle tool to ease the black clay between the teeth.
Set the skull aside and move on to . . .

The Ghost*

Condition the ghost clay. I used about 1.5 ounces of white clay plus the little bit of leftover pink clay from the skull. Again, use less if you want a smaller cane in the end.
As with the skull, fold the clay into a narrow strip about 1” wide and sheet it on setting no.3. Roll the clay into a cylinder.
Shape the cylinder into a long teardrop shape.
Continue to pull out the narrow end of the teardrop and shape it into a thin, curving tail for the ghost.
Use a needle tool to mark the eye placement. This time I went with oval shaped eyes rather than completely round.
Cut through the center of the eyes.
As with the skull, use a small round cutter to cut out the eye holes. Reassemble to make sure they line up on both sides of the face before filling with the black clay.
Fill the holes with a snake of black clay and trim flush on both sides.
Reassemble the ghost and wrap with a thin sheet (no.7) of black clay.
Set ghost aside

*Note: Add some little arms to your ghost if you’d like it to look less, um, tadpole-ish. I’m not the only one who sees it, am I?.

The Bat

Condition the clay, fold it into a narrow strip, sheet on a medium setting, and roll it into a cylinder. Flatten the cylinder and stretch it out to about twice the length as the height of the skull and ghost canes. For example, if those canes are 1” in height make this cylinder 2’ in length.
Shape the cylinder into a rough batwing shape. Draw the shape on a piece of paper and use that as a template if this helps you with the shaping.
Cut the “wing” in half to form two wings.
If needed, trim away a small amount of clay at the join of the wings to get them to sit as you’d like and join them together.
Add a small triangle of clay at the bottom of the wings for the body.
Add a small cylinder of clay for the head above the wings.
Place two very small triangles of clay on either side of the head where it joins the body.
Use the knitting needle to smooth out the triangles and form a neat join.
Add two small triangles to the bottom of the wings keeping them closer to the body than center of the wings.

Use a knitting needle and your fingers to shape the wings a little more to your liking before moving on to assembling the final cane.

A Note About the Backing Clay

Before you start adding the backing clay make sure you have plenty mixed up so you don’t run out. If you’re using a clay straight out of the package or have a recipe this isn’t such an issue. However, if you’re using scrap clay as I did, you need to make sure you have enough to get the job done. I weighed my three canes and doubled that amount to mix up my background color. This way I knew there’d be no fear of running out.

Wrapping the Bat

adding the background clay to the smaller cane components

Make a very small triangle for the bat’s ears.
Place a small sheet of the background clay on the two longer sides of the triangle.
Reduce the triangle to the size you’d like for the ears. Cut in half and place on top of the bat’s head.
Roll logs of background clay and shape them to fit around the wings, top and bottom.
Smooth the logs to neatly fill the gaps and trim away any excess as I did at the bottom of the wings. Wrap the entire bat with a sheet of background clay rolled out at the thickest setting. (I forgot to photograph this last step.)

Wrapping the Skull

Roll a thin snake of background clay and place between the indents for the teeth.
Add flattened logs of clay to the cheek hollows of the skull.
Finally, wrap the skull in a thick sheet of background clay.

Wrapping the Ghost

Adding background clay to the ghost cane

The ghost is wrapped in a similar fashion. Shape logs to fit the curves of the tail and then wrap in a thick sheet of background clay.

The Final Packing

filling in all the gaps in the cute polymer clay halloween cane

Arrange the three wrapped canes as you’d like them in the finished cane.
Begin by shaping triangles of clay to fill in the gaps between the pieces.
Continue filling in with appropriately shaped logs of clay. The better you fill in the gaps the better your final results will be.
Once all the gaps have been filled begin wrapping the cane in thick sheets of clay.
Trim away the excess clay to bring the cane into a rectangular shape.
If needed, add some more clay to the corners to fill them out and trim again.
Should you decide you don’t like the placement of one of the pieces, as I did, simply cut into the cane and rearrange things. I decided I didn’t like the skull and the bat at the same angle so I cut into the cane, changed the angle of the skull and filled in the background clay again.

Reducing the Cane

It’s best to let this cane sit overnight or at least for several hours before attempting to reduce it. The individual components and the backing clay should all have a chance to cool down and firm up or they’ll move at different rates.

Take your time when reducing and be sure to flip the cane over often so you’re adding pressure to each side equally.

Once you’ve reached the dimensions you’d like for the final size, cut into the cane to have a look at your work and then let it sit again. Slicing up a freshly reduced cane will result in squished and distorted slices. Let it rest overnight before you begin creating with it. Find more tips for canes here.

If you’ve enjoyed learning how to make this cute polymer clay Halloween cane and give this tutorial a try please tag @bysandracallander on Instagram!

As always, if you have any questions or comments, I’m happy to hear from you.