When I made last year’s Willy Wonka costume I made some Wonka Bars for my then 6 year old to take into school. This year I have decided to up the game by making some Wonka Scrumdidilyumptious Bars.

The first step to making the bars was to find an inexpensive and widely available chocolate bar that was long and narrow, just as Wonka’s is in the movie. This also lent itself to fitting the long name of the chocolate bar on the wrappers I was making. I settled on CurlyWurlys, which are nowhere near as long as they used to be when I was young, but which would have to suffice.

Unlike last year’s Wonka Bars I wanted the Scrumdidilyumptious Bars to be as close to the 1970’s movie originals as possible. As I didn’t have a costume to make I had the time to design the wrappers to resemble the original movie props as closely as I could. Last year’s Wonka Bars were an afterthought, and a last minute addition to the day, made with what little time and random materials I happened to have around me. This year I have been able to organise my materials and spend time on the design, and to enjoy the process lot more.

A Scrumdidilyumptious Bar, How Does Wonka Do It?

Designing the net shape for the card wrapper is pretty simple, and I thank my primary school maths lessons for and small amount of skill I needed to do this, as I managed it even with a head full of flu and a raging fever.

After I had made the first ‘proof of concept’ bar I realised that I had spelled ‘Scrumdidilyumptious’ wrong (so concerned was I with remembering that there was not a double ‘d’ that I missed the second ‘i’), so I spent a lot of time scrutinising the relevant parts of the movie to try and get the wrappers just right.

I tried to get all of the elements of the bar as close to the movie original as possible, with pink and orange stripes at the bottom of the brown wrapper, white Wonka text and yellow top hat and main text elements.

I made the Scrumdidilyumptious Bar wrappers out of card, because as anyone who has ever bought a Curly Wurly bar knows (especially the new anaemic version that Willy Wonka would certainly not approve of) they never arrive in one piece, and the cardboard wrapper gives them some structure.

If I had access to a colour printer the design and making process would likely be very simple. However, I do not, so all of the elements of decoration on the wrapper had to be individually cut and then carefully applied. Though this made for a much longer making process, the results feel really substantial and tactile.

You Were Born To Be A Wonkarer

I have made a good enough number of Scrumdidilyumptious Bars for each of the students and classroom staff to have one each, and much as some of the kids like dressing up, one thing that they almost universally enjoy is chocolate. I’ve also made one for myself, as a keepsake, because the wrapper itself brings me joy every time I look at it.

UPDATE: A Case Of Wonka Bars

I truly believe that if you are going to be an extra persons you should be extra extra. There’s no point in being a bit extra. Go big or go home. And if you are going to make an effort, make a big effort.

So if I have spent hours designing and making enough Scrumdidilyumptious Bars to please a whole classroom of Wonka Bar fans, they’d better arrive looking like they have come straight from The Chocolate Factory.

The day before World Book Day I worked out the dimensions of the stacked bars and made a cardboard carton to hold all of the bars. It’s a simple addition, but it’s one of those little details that just makes it feel more ‘real’ for me, plus it was simple enough to be a little bit of practice at a time when I wasn’t feeling too well.