We decided to keep it simple for this set design. We created this set for an 11-week series I wrote called Scripture Files which will be available soon. In this series, kids will be encouraged to memorize the books of the Bible as they learn about a different section of the Bible each week. They will begin an investigation with Detective Clue to find out if the Bible really is the Word of God. The cost for this set design was about $50. My inspiration for this set design was detective television shows. For this series, we focused primarily on the main stage area, but I will give you some ideas for taking this theme off the stage as well at the end of this post.

Let’s start with this giant magnifying glass, and I do mean giant! It was bigger than me! I actually didn’t make this set piece, but found someone a little more artistic to help me out. The magnifying glass was made cardboard we already had. It was cut out using an x-acto knife and painted with acrylic paints. If you are like me, and you are not as good at painting the details as the person who made this magnifying glass, you can still make this piece. It just may not look as realistic as the one in this post. We decided to hang our magnifying glass from the bottom of our center screen using clear fishing line. You could also put it on a stand or create a stand out of cardboard and place it anywhere in your room or on your stage. I had planned on making a smaller version of this magnifying glass to put in our 1st-2nd grade room, but I never got around to it with the craziness of Easter. Be advised that the cardboard did begin to bow and bend a little after it was painted, but it still looked great and held up for the entire series.

The detective’s office was my favorite part of the set design. There is a character in the Scripture Files series called Detective Anita Clue and she NEEDED an temporary office space that also just happened to be a part of our stage. We had a lot of fun creating an office for her. All of our skit happened in her office for the series. We used a lot of things we had on hand at the church for her office, and I’m sure you would be able to get your hands on many of these items or similar items for your detective’s office. We already had the extra desk, office chair, globe, floor lamp, trench coat, and books. We did end up purchasing a few items to take the office to the next level. I found an old antique typewriter for her desk at a garage sale. It was such a great piece and I only paid $5 for it. We also purchased this coat rack because we didn’t know anyone who owned one. We put the trench coat on the coat rack as well as these detective hats. We also purchased some large magnifying glasses at the Dollar Tree and this awesome top secret stamp. The only other item we purchased was these sticky foot prints that we put on the floor (you can see them in the picture of the full stage above). I have used these foot prints twice and one time I had no problem removing them, but this time we had to scrape them off the floor. So, keep that in mind if you choose to use them. Here is a closer look at some of the random items we had on Detective Clue’s desk.

We chose to keep it simple this time, but if you are interested in bringing your theme more into the rest of your environments I have a few suggestions. You could purchase a big roll of caution tape and put it on doors, walls, or anywhere you want. Cheap and fun decor! Buy a bunch of the large black magnifying glasses from the Dollar Tree or Walmart and hang them from the ceiling around the room. You could even make a chalk outline of a person on the floor using thin white tape and make it look like a crime scene. We did this with a previous series and the kids loved it. I hope you enjoyed this set design and it has given you inspiration to do one of your own!

The 11-week Scripture Files series with bonus Easter material will be available soon.