If you’re tired of buying a fresh pumpkin every year just to watch it slowly melt into a puddle of orange goo, let me introduce you to concrete pumpkins. Yes, they weigh a ton, take forever to make, and at some point you’ll wonder why you didn’t just buy a $10 plastic one at the craft store. But when they’re done? Oh, they’re glorious. Solid. Permanent. The Arnold Schwarzenegger of fall decor.
Here’s the deal: it’s messy, your neighbors will definitely give you side-eye when you’re filling pantyhose with wet cement, and at some point you’ll question your sanity. But the results? Gorgeous, durable pumpkins that you can toss in the garden, leave on the porch, or keep on your balcony without worrying about mold, raccoons, or small children kicking them over. Honestly, I think this might be my peak DIY moment.
What You’ll Need
- Cement
- Sand
- Water
- Nylon stockings or old tights
- String or rope
- Aluminum foil
- Old rags
- Acrylic paints and brushes
- Outdoor varnish or wet-stone sealant
The recipe is simple: 2 parts cement, 1 part sand, and just enough water to make it look like sour cream (the thick one, not the watery diet stuff). If it pours like pancake batter, congrats, you’ve made sludge.
Prep a holder from a plastic bottle.
Now here comes the fun (read: questionable) part. Grab a pair of old nylon stockings—yes, really—and stuff them with cement.
Tie it off, then take some string and squeeze it into those pumpkin ridges.
If you want it to look extra authentic, tuck a rock in the middle to give it that nice dimpled top. Put it down, add a small weight, and let it sit for two days. Pro tip: do not poke it every hour like I did. Cement does not appreciate your impatience.
At this point, you could hot-glue a stick on top and call it a day. But where’s the drama in that? I wanted stems that matched the pumpkins.
So I grabbed some aluminum foil, twisted it into a shape that looked more like a sad churro than a stem, and then dunked strips of rag into a runny cement mix to wrap around it.
The trick here is to not panic when it looks like trash. Cement is forgiving—you can keep layering and adjusting until it stops resembling a churro and starts resembling an actual pumpkin stem. Worst case scenario? Just say it’s “modern art.”.
Honestly, the raw gray pumpkins already looked kind of chic. Very minimalist, very Scandinavian, very “my decor budget is unlimited.” But my garden needed color, so out came the paints. I started with primer.
Next some white paint to prime some more.
Then I mixed up acrylic paints—orange with a bit of ochre for the base, and some yellow or red for highlights.
Each pumpkin turned out slightly different, which I could pretend was intentional, but really, it was just me messing around. Still, they looked way more natural that way.
For the stems, I started with a gray-brown coat, then dabbed on ochre, green, and white using a sponge. Basically, I invented camouflage for pumpkins, which makes zero sense, but looked great.
Once the paint dried, I sealed them with outdoor varnish. That’s the final boss of DIY—it makes them shiny and keeps the weather from wrecking them. And then, the moment of truth: I dragged my concrete children out to the garden and set them up next to the mums.
They looked so good in the autumn sun, I almost forgot how heavy they were. Almost. Let’s just say if you want to get your workout in, try carrying three cement pumpkins across the yard.
And yes, staring at them made me want pumpkin pie. But no, I didn’t try making one out of cement. I do have limits.
So cool!.
Final Thoughts
So yeah, concrete pumpkins. They’re heavy, they’re weird, and they’ll probably confuse your mailman. But here’s the deal: they won’t rot, they won’t attract fruit flies, and they’ll still be sitting pretty long after your neighbors’ store-bought gourds have collapsed into a biohazard.
These pumpkins are basically the tank of fall decor. Rain? No problem. Wind? Bring it. Kids kicking them around? Good luck, Timmy, hope you like stubbed toes. Honestly, the only real downside is explaining to your friends why you’re mixing cement in your driveway like a wannabe contractor.
Would I make them again? 100%. They look awesome, they last forever, and—bonus—you get a free arm workout every time you move them. Plus, nothing beats the satisfaction of knowing you made your own pumpkins out of literal stone while everyone else is out here panic-buying gourds that will be mush in two weeks.
Concrete pumpkins: the DIY you never knew you needed, but absolutely deserve.