Dr. Van Helsing's Vampire Hunter Kit

For most of our parties we attempted to give out prizes, usually cheap knick-knacks from the dollar store. Unfortunately on more than one occasion we completely forgot about the prizes until the end of the night and ended up throwing them at our departing guests. It's sad, really. For La Fête Sanguinaire, we decided that we would have a costume contest with fabulous prizes and we would actually give them away. It couldn't just be knick-knacks though. We had some movie monster figurines that would be fine second or third place prizes, but this was our fanciest party yet so we needed some great first-place prizes.

Vampire Hunter Kits were mostly sold to tourists in eastern Europe in the olden days. They were usually fancy boxes with lots of compartments and vials of mysterious magical things. I thought it would be amazing to make some as prizes.

The boxes are plain wooden boxes with handles from a craft store. I painted the lettering and handle with burgundy and black acrylic that I had on hand. After it was dry, I glazed each one with Mod Podge gloss. I also used fabric to line the inside of the box, which is just glued down. If I did it again, I would stain the wood first since the Mod Podge didn't darken it at all and I would hope that an antique kit would be darker.

Inside, I used small containers for sorting beads or nails to hold the various components of the kit. One held rice, since according to legend if a vampire encounters rice or seeds he has to stop and count them all before continuing after you. The second held garlic powder, for obvious reasons. A third held some of Dr. Van Helsing's patent-pending Crystal Sunlight. It seems that often these kits would have some sort of gimmick like this to make them stand out from the other kits around. Crystal Sunlight is merely translucent white glitter. It burns on contact! The last container was for holy water. I bravely entered an actual Catholic church to obtain the water a few weeks before the party.

In addition to the little containers, the kit also includes a mirror to detect vampires. For this, I purchased a plastic compact from the Dollar Tree and took the two mirrors out of it. I sewed a simple pouch out of fake leather to hold each one. I also bought some silver-plate cross necklaces from the Dollar Tree and sewed a sheer white pouch for each of these. Finally, the extra wooden crosses were from a craft store and were plain wood painted with mod podge.

If you have the means, some little details that would put a kit like this over the edge would be tiny corked glass vials instead of the plastic ones I had to use, and a case large enough to hold a stake and mallet. Tyler was going to make tiny stakes for these kits, but time ran out. I've seen some great kits made from silverware cases; the small velvet-lined compartments are perfect for something like this. A doctor's apothecary case would also be perfect, but if I had one of those I would keep it for myself!

As a finishing touch, pasted to the inside of the box is a description of the contents in broken eastern European English. It reads:
Ingredients:
Mirror. Use for detecting Vampires have no reflexion. Protect in faux-leather sleeve.
Rice. Spill on ground for Vampire must count all grains before proceeding.
Silver-plated Cross Amulet. Protects from Vampire attacks when worn around the necks.
Garlic Powder. Sprinkle across doorway, window sills and other point of entry to prevent them Vampires from enters.
Holy Water. Burn on contacts.
Dr. Van Helsing's Patented Crystal Sunlight. Crystals burn on contact like sunlights and can useful if the Vampire has transforms into mist or animals form.
Wooden Cross. Repels Vampire.

The costume contest was a big success, and the prizes went to Captain Kat of the Criminal Dawn, and the Michael the Undertaker. Here they are with their prizes, along with our second and third place winners: