I have decided to take up wand-crafting in light of the fact that the wands available at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter are all made of resin, and there's hardly anything available to buy from other fans, even on deviant art. Are there any tips any of you can offer me, or even just comments on what you like to see and what you hate from home-made wands?

I widdled mine, from sticks.

Wooden craft dowels! I'm practicing to make one for a friend, and they're proving to be very easy to work with. So far, I've just been using a dowel and small kitchen knife. Paint or stain will come later, if needed.
I made a prototype, and it's great if I do say so.

Plus, they come cut at about 12" (the ones I bought, at least), so it's a good length! Although, the one I'm doing has shortened to about 11.5" or so.
They come in various thicknesses, so there's more variety to find a comfortable fit.

Also, if you have a fancy handle in mind, dowel caps work fabulously! They come fitted to the different sizes of dowels, so they fit snuggly on the dowel. If you find the right size, of course. (I got too big of a size. ><)

Both can be found in just about any craft store or craft section of certain department stores. I got my dowels at Wal-Mart and my caps at Hobby Lobby. They're not terribly expensive, if I recall correctly.

Oh, and carving swirls is hard. Hard. Not impossible, but very tedious!

The overall experience is pretty fun, though! Good luck with yours~! ^^

Sand down some dowel rods & then (if you don't want to take the time to carve wood grains into it) use wood stains that are different colors to get the graining effect.

Depends how realistic you want to be my cousin and I have tried loads of wands paper, moulding and of course wood my cousin loves harry potter and she wanted it really realistic so the paper one was out of the question I would note that the paper wand only lasts hmmm? Five to six weeks

The moulding usually turns out really wrong if you're un patient and it doesn't have the nice feel

Wood is by far the best and theres another way instead of going to the carving troubles! All you need is a gardening stick (The things that go against plants to make sure they're straight) Some moulding clay and paint so simple okay! Get the stick and clay and wrap it around the bottom and hold on to it I swear it comes out like harry's wand put depends what kind of clay you bought I bought the normel one the you mould it's easier leave it for a few hours till it's dry then paint it so cool even I liked it

I plan to sell some of the wands I've made someday. The first step in my process is to find a stick, it can be any shape, any size, as long as you like it. Then, I usually draw a picture of it on a sheet 8 1/2 by 11 printer paper (the design usually changes as I carve it though) After that I carve the bark off the stick with a wood-plane, and I put it in the oven after dinner is cooked to dry it off, after about two times of doing that it is usually dry. The next step I carve the design into it with a pocket knife (which comes out better when it's dry, when it's wet the knife doesn't go deep enough into the wood) Then, if I want to, I stain it with wood stain (my most recent one didn't get stained, I liked the natural color of it) If I don't stain it, I use a Sharpie to outline the design I carved into it, because the stain makes the design more prominent. I usually use two coats of stain, sometimes more or less if I want the color darker or lighter. Then I coat it twice with polyurethane sealant. Then it's done! Sometimes I don't carve a design into it, which eliminates a few steps, I also plan to try dowel rods soon, and I'll post how that goes...

This sounds awesome, I would love to see some of your crafts when finished. I think the one problem I have with some wands i see are the look and feel of them. I with they would look more raw. The ones I have seen seems to look too costume. Also, to try and use the different types of woods that are used in wand making.

I hope to post some of my designs soon. From the way you described what you look for, you might like them. I have finished three wands so far, and I'm currently working on three more, I'll try to post them soon!

I made a Hermione wand out of paper, newspaper clippings, a chopstick, and superglue a year ago. It turned out very nicely.

I've finished carving a wand out of a dowel rod, and I think it turned out pretty good! I still need to stain and varnish it, but as of right now the hard part is done!

I even carved the Deathly Hallows symbol into the handle:

Hello lovely SS Crafty peeps!

I've been making a few wands using paper and hot glue. They're a bit delicate (ie they break inside if your 8 year old son whacks something too hard whilst casting), but otherwise they are awesome, easy to make and super cool looking. I learned how on Instructables.com at this instructable. Rather than leaving the middle hollow, I actually fill the tubes completely with hot glue. It's time consuming and tiring for the squeezing hand (or supermegapainful the next day if you suffer from repetetive strain injury like tendonitis or carpal tunnel), but worth it.

I have a bunch in progress and will try and post a pic when I get around to finishing them.

i've, personally, only been making wands for a couple days and playing with techniques to see what i like best; i've found carving has been the hardest part. i haven't delved into any stains yet, but am just trying to get the basics down first. i've also found that i am a HUGE fan of the burnt look, so i've been torching them a bit to make them look like they've "seen it all".
the two below were the first two i've done, the one with the bow is from a maple tree in my front yard; the other was from a tree near the gulf by my house. with the one with the bow, i just sanded it down and burnt the handle, then carved in polka dots. i kept it gnarled looking because it was intended for me, and that's the look i prefer to just being straight and even. the other, i carved out the swirls and dots then painted them with black nail polish, after that i torched the whole thing.

wandz2.JPG

with the one below, which i did today, i carved out notches in the handle and tried to round the edges down a bit, then carved swirls from the handle to the tip and painted them with purple nail polish, which i then torched. i am not as satisfied with this one as i am the other two but it was a different type of wood and was still very wet when i started the process so i suppose you live and you learn. i still think it came out alright but not the quality which i was hoping to achieve.

wand2.JPG

i've found it's much much much easier to work with dry material, though in the case of the wood from the maple, the carving was easiest while it was still in the process of drying. i'm currently working on one with a large handle that comes to a straight, smaller tip (much like tom riddle's wand from the movies.). i hope to also start working with some finishes soon and will hopefully have better tools for carving in the near future. i'm planning on doing a whole series of them to give to hp friends and keep some for a wall display in my house. : ) either way, practice makes perfect and as long as we keep at it, we will be able to pump out some really interesting things!

love it!!! : ) i had also thought of putting the Deathly Hallows symbol on one of mine, but i'm not going to attempt it until i have more of a steady hand with my dremel tool. kudos to you for making it so EVEN! if i may ask, what did you use for carving? just a regular carving knife?

I'll post pictures later, but I've been making wands with bamboo lately! If you want to put a core of sorts inside you are able with bamboo. Fill in one end with hardening clay, spackling for walls or even hot glue. Cut it to the size you would like, I use a small hand saw for mine. Remember the knots prevent having a full hollow core.

You can use pretty much anything for a core, whether it be seeds, feathers, hair, etc. Just choose your core, and then as you had with the other end, seal the end up.

I actually put a peacock feather into the one that I made, and my son decided on carrot seeds lol! While my other son put a cat tail into his.

Now for designing. You can take the hot glue and do designs for the handles like I did or even carve the bamboo with a knife if you wish to. The ones I will show a picture of later are done with hot glue.

Once that's all done, paint it with acrylic paint if you wish!

Wow, sorry I never replied! But thank you!! :heart2: If you're still interested in knowing, yes, I just used a regular carving knife. I've always had a really steady hand, so that helps a lot when doing craft projects like this. ;D

The way they did it at the midnight release of Cursed Child at my books a million was from hotglue beads and chopsticks. It was a pretty unique take I have to say. haha