Sakura Katana Project Journey
Always wanted to make a decent cherry blossom-themed katana prop for my garden photoshoots. Saw some fancy ones online but thought, heck why not try making my own. So I grabbed my toolbox one Saturday morning and just started.
First, the messy planning part:
- Dug through my shed for materials – found an old wooden broom handle for the core.
- Cut up some cardboard boxes for the blade shape, made like five ugly versions before one looked kinda right.
- Mixed pink acrylic paint with white for that faded sakura color, ended up with this weird salmon shade at first. Had to dump more red in.
Then came the painful building phase:
- Glued the cardboard blade pieces around the broom handle – used way too much glue, sticky mess everywhere.
- Tried carving cherry blossom patterns with my wood burner. Burnt the cardboard twice. Smelled terrible.
- Spray-painted the whole thing silver-ish. Forgot about wind direction. Pink overspray hit my neighbor’s fence. Oops.
After lunch, things got slightly better. Threw some glitter glue on for dewdrop effects – looked like a kindergarten craft project. Was ready to quit until I dry-brushed white over the sakura carvings. Suddenly it popped! Got my garden scissors, snipped fake cherry blossom branches from wife’s floral stash. Wrapped ’em around the handle with garden wire. Looked decent from 5 feet away.
Final touch? Hot-glued pink fabric strips for the hilt wrap. Burned my fingers three times. Stuck it upright in the soil for photos. Cloudy day ruined the lighting. Took like 40 shots before one showed the glitter without looking cheap.
Honestly? Looks amateur close up. But propped against my real cherry tree at sunset? Phone pics got 200 likes. Most comments asked where bought it. Felt stupid proud. Next time I’d skip the damn glitter.
