Walk into any craft store and you will see oodles of fun activities. Painting sunny pictures. Scrapbooking. Rubber stamping. Flower arranging.
All of those are great — as long as your a girl. It’s true some boys might even like them, but not too many.
Even then, when you’re all done with your scrapbook and your rubber-stamp project, they usually end up looking very quaint, dainty or even pretty. Not exactly the kind of thing that makes a boy feel cool.
In fact, there’s not much to hang in a boys room, unless you’re going to offer except of the Avengers, Star Wars, Transformers or a sports hero. To steer clear of such merchandising, you have to make it yourself.
The problem is, after baseball and dinosaurs, craft stores are usually barren of ideas for boys. Well, Comics on the Brain is here to change that with our massive list of craft themes for boys.
Yes, it’s true, craft stores do offer some stuff for boys. There’s model kits, volcano dioramas, Boy Scout pinewood cars and science experiments. But those are all projects that you build with a boy. Not necessarily a craft you can make for them for a birthday or special occasion or, even better, mass produce and sell at a craft fair.
CotB suggests you to take a look at all the “frilly crafts” out there and apply a boy-friendly theme. You have to steer past those wood-craft projects with the “heart-shaped holes.” You will often have to put aside the paint kits that come with a lot of crafts — ones that have pinks, purples and aquamarines. You’ll have to figure out ways to de-pretty the craft.
Most importantly, you will have to adapt. You have to look at the shape of the object you’re about to build and think about how it can become “cool.” The best way to do that is to figure out how to apply a boy-friendly theme.
THEMES
This is a list of boy-friendly themes that can be applied to craft projects.
- Superheroes and villains
- Race cars and motorcycles
- Cowboys and Indians
- Sports: Baseball, football, basketball, hockey and lacrosse
- Maps and topography
- Soldiers, sailors and marines
- Tanks, Jeeps and Humvees
- Helicopters and jet planes
- Boats and submarines
- Deep sea divers and sunken ships
- Jungle lords and lost kingdoms
- Dinosaurs and volcanoes
- Sharks, Octopi and orcas
- Wolves and bears
- Lions, tigers and panthers
- Frogs and salamanders
- Snakes and alligators
- Construction equipment and big rigs
- Tools and blueprints
- Bugs (the non-cute kind) and spiders
- Ninjas and samurais
- Karate fighters and fighting duels
- Pirates and treasure chests
- Barbarians and vikiings
- Wizards and warriors
- Mythical monsters and classic heroes
- Space ships and planets
- Aliens and sci-fi
- Astronauts and rockets
- Robots and cyborgs
- Knights and castles
- Cops and robbers
- Detectives and spies
- Firefighters and firetrucks
- Caves and mines
- Dragons and other fantasy beasts
- Man-monsters: Vampires, zombies, bigfoot, mummies, werewolves and Frankenstein’s monster
- Ancient cultures: Egypt, Aztec, Rome and early Asia
- Rock stars and country musicians
- Science labs and equipment
- Bunkers and missiles
- Safaris and animals
Even better, take two of those themes above and merge them. Mummies on motorcycles. Astronauts vs. dragons. Racing cars through a mine. Zombies on bulldozers. You get the idea. Be creative and let a kid enjoy your creativity too.
Leave a Reply