Universal’s Volcano Bay opened up this past summer at Universal Orlando and the park is beautiful. Who doesn’t want their own light up volcano, right?!? I for sure do!

I started with some rough sketches for reference when sculpting. I sculpted floral foam that is typically used for plastic flowers.

The mountain is made of eight stacked layers of foam. I sculpted some columnar basalt rock formations that is created by volcanic activity.

Chiseling away foam using a flat edge X-Acto blade for the sculpting is very helpful- a great suggestion from our friend Mitch at Imagineering Disney.

You can see some of the subtle and not so subtle tikis that are sculpted in the foam.

After the sculpting, I spray painted each layer of foam.

Time to start detailing. This nifty Lazy Susan was very helpful.

The staircases and bridges are made from a cut up Ikea placemat!

Using two tones of green in the shrubbery brings contrast and ‘pop’ to the vegetation.

Paper strips and straight pins help mock up where the waterfalls will reside.

A peek inside my lovely home office, I’m very grateful to have this workspace.

In the next part, I’ll share how to thread fiber optics, create waterfalls and more.