What kind of molds to get for my Garden Art business?

Probably one of the most important pieces of equipment needed for your garden art business is your molds. Since I manufacture molds at www.cementmolds.com I thought I would give a quick summary of the types of molds available on the market today and their pluses and negatives.

Aluminum Molds

These are the most durable and have been around for many years. You can only find these used as no one is making them any more due to there cost. They are very strong but you don’t get some of the fine detail you get with others. If you have any, hang on to them as they are collectors items!

ABS Plastic

A hard plastic mold created with heat and a vacuum that pulls the plastic over a master. They can be durable and inexpensive, but are only 1 dimensional. So you can only produce flat pavers and stepping stones with a design on one surface of the mold.     

 Rubber

There are many types of natural and artificial rubber used to make molds. Rubber starts as a liquid and is poured or sprayed over the three dimensional master to create the mold. Rubber is great as it is very flexible and easy to demould after pouring your concrete. It also picks up all the detail from the master, so if you have a bad original you get a bad mold, which then creates a bad finished product. 

Now that you have the rubber mold, how do you support it to allow the concrete to form. Have you ever taken a ballon and filled it up with water, then set it on the counter. What happens does it change shape? Well the cheap rubber molds you can purchase on Ebay are exactly that. They expect you find something like your sandbox to fit the mold in and make it still look good with no bulges or indents. How do you shake or tap the trapped air bubbles out of the mold if it is in sand?

Well how about a custom fit fibreglass casing that wraps the rubber as well as has feet to allow it to stand up on it’s own so you can pour the concrete right in the mold, shake it, and move around your work space to dry?

What about expense? Yes you pay more for the rubber with fibreglass casings, but you should be able to get your investment back by selling 4 or 5 finsihed items. In other words take the price of the mold an divide by 4 to get you retail price of the garden art.