Xfactor – Biography books
There are lots of famous people, each one with different personalities and characteristics. What makes those people so special?
Do they all have the Xfactor?
I wanted to create a display connecting our biography books to the International Baccalaureate characteristics such as: ‘Thinkers’
‘Perseverance’
‘Communicators’ ‘Resilient’
‘Principled’
and raise the question: ‘Do all those famous people have these characteristics or is it something else that gives them – the Xfactor?
It had to be a vibrant and colourful display, posh and upmarket – showing paparazzi features common in gossip magazines
What you need:
- Fabric – 3 different patterns/colours for background
- Fabric – pink voile, army patterned, feathery patterned
- 3 Foam heads – 2 women, 1 man
- 2 Hats, sunglasses, feather etc.
- ‘Black board’ cart
- Title – the X factor
- IB characteristics – printed and laminated
What to do:
- Cover the background with the green – black – yellow fabric. I used left-over for the top part – too small to cover it completely and had to create a frilly kind of extra in the middle. It gave it unintentionally extra dimension
- Staple the title to the board
- Staple the black board cards to the board
- Attach the IB characteristics to the black cards with pins or staples – you could write them on the black board card as well!
- Place the foam heads on the shelf – use Blu-Tack or double sided tape to secure them
- Drape the feathery fabric around the first head, stick a feather in the fabric
- Place the sunglasses on the nose of the middle one and put her hat on, secure it with tape – drape the pink voile around her neck and let it hang down in a pointy way. Cut it if necessary and tape it to give it the shape you want
- Drape the army fabric around the neck of the man and secure it with staples or tape. Put his hat on
- Cover the boxes in left-over fabric and use the glue gun or staples to secure it
- Put the display stands on the boxes and secure them with tape
- Put the books on the stands and on the shelves
Stand back and have a look at your own creation – does it need adjustment?
Are the heads posh and glamorous? Do you need to drape the fabric in shape?
Be critical – think how will others see it. A good tool to help you is a mirror. Get a decent size mirror and look at your display from that angle. It shows you the uneven parts, the slightly out-of-line title or the books that need a different place. Sometimes the covers or size of the books don’t go well together when placed beside each other. Take note of that – you want to show them in the most attractive way!
Filed under: Biographies, Celebrities, Education, Other