Cemetery archway

One of the last minute projects I'm trying to get done is the archway for the cemetery.  Upon some rewatchings of Hocus Pocus, and looking more closely at the graveyard and cottage, I realized one of the big signs is to the "Old Burial Hill" cemetery.  And the front yard was lacking a little something--it's going to be mostly bland with just graves this year...and an inflatable Binx :)

So I needed a sign.  For letters, I decided to go easy and just print out some from a font that looked close...ish.  I cut them all out, then laminated them all, then cut them out again.  The lamination is necessary for the weather.  I opted to go with a distressed cream and a black border.  I'm hoping the light letters will catch the light in the night, and the black border around them so they don't totally disappear during the day.  As for an archway--I looked at a couple of options.  The sign in the movie is clearly arched.  But I need something relatively stable.  So.  My plan (currently) is to reuse the old Jurassic Park columns from a few years ago.  They were super unstable, but that  was because I had them on the driveway.  This time, I'm hoping to drill a hole through the bottom and top wide enough to slide a piece of pvc through.  And the pvc will go on a piece of rebar.  Which I know is much more stable. 


The actual arch was a little trickier.  I wanted to use PVC for the stability factor, but needed a way to bend it easily.  I thought of using the heat gun, but had also heard that it tended to bend it more sharply rather than curve.  I eventually came across a video that used boiling water and a funnel.  They stopped up one side of the pvc, then poured the boiling water down it, slowly bending it into the desired arch.  They also ran a piece of nylon cord through it so that it could be tied at the desired archway while the tube cooled and set.  This ended up working really well--I wish I had taken in progress pics, but that would have required another set of hands, and I already had Sam help me with it.  I made two arches so that the letters for the sign could sit between both.  I had several 45 degree elbows and a t joint that made the whole thing come together.  I set it on 2 pieces of rebar in the hard so that I could spray paint it.  I'm thinking of going back over it with some gray...maybe.  The columns are gray, and it would be nice to not have the arches fade into the darkness.  If they were a light gray, they might stand out a bit better.  Not sure.  Will take a poll....

So after the final paint job, I'll attach the letters, and then attach the whole arch to the piece of pvc going through the columns.  Oh, and then I was going to add some faux chains to make it clear NOT to go through the archway that I just set up.