As someone from a really religious household, I wasn’t allowed to celebrate Halloween growing up. However, my favorite part of the night was sitting on the gray couch by my door and peeking through the windows to see the streets flooded with people dressed up as movie characters, superheroes and ghosts.
For my first Halloween four years ago, I dressed up as Olaf, my favorite Disney character. I wore a crocheted hat my mom made me as a gift and a white shirt with buttons I added to it. That simple getup sparked my love for DIY Halloween costumes.
Each year, I scroll social media to find inspiration and ideas for my Halloween costumes, only to be disappointed by costumes consisting of a corset, skirt and hat.
Minimalistic culture has no place in a holiday with exorbitant amounts of candy, crazy lawn decor and spooky scares lurking around every corner. When else will you have the opportunity to wear a fun costume? We need to bring back wearing real costumes for Halloween, no matter how old you are or what plans you have.
I’m not saying you need to go out and buy a brand new costume. Making your own costume is a great way to add to the charm and fun of the Halloween season. But, there’s a significant difference between using items you own to fully dress up and a low-effort character inspired outfit that you can only guess because of one accessory.
For this Halloween season, I’ve already decided who I’m going to dress up as. I’m recreating an iconic look from one of my all-time favorite movies, “10 Things I Hate About You.” I’m dressing up as Kat Stratford from the paintball scene, a costume that I’ve been wanting to do for a really long time. In a dream world, I would recreate her prom look — a gorgeous blue dress I’ve dreamed of wearing since I first watched the movie, but it’s impossible to find.
Creating a fun Halloween look doesn’t have to be complicated or time consuming; the look I’m recreating is simple and cheap. I ordered a $12 white jumpsuit, and I’ll be using some leftover paint and borrowing my friend’s lab goggles. I estimate it’ll take me an hour to make the jumpsuit, and then I’ll have a costume I’m excited to wear.
If you have no clue where to start, I recommend scrolling through Instagram, Pinterest and TikTok. There are a lot of different ideas you can find, like funny pun costumes or cute Disney characters. You can find videos and images of deconstructed costumes so you can compile every item you need for your outfit. It’s also fun to ask your friends and get their advice as excitement builds for Oct. 31.
It can be really difficult to narrow down what to wear when there’s no limits on who or what you can be. Something that helps me decide is figuring out what my Halloween plans are. If you’re going out to Midtown, your costume will probably be really different from a movie night at a friend’s apartment.
Another factor is how recognizable you want your costume to be. For example, dressing like Superman is definitely going to be more well-known than a niche costume like Milo from “Atlantis: The Lost Empire.” I also love dressing up with other people and planning your costumes together, whether it be a group costume or couples costume.
It’s cool to care and show up to parties with a costume that says something about you. It’s easy to get insecure when you put effort into what you’re wearing, but committing to the bit has better payoff. I understand you want a cute picture you can post on Instagram, but actually wearing the costume is central to the spirit of Halloween. Don’t let the need to be nonchalant get in the way of actually enjoying spooky season.
Emily Moreno is a 19-year-old UF BFA dance sophomore.
