Two cosplayers tell you how to dress up for Halloween
Do you really want to indulge your wild side and dress up in a fun costume this Halloween but don’t have too much time on your hands to put together a costume or burn a hole in your pocket by getting a ready-made one? Cosplayers Tanzim Pardiwalla and Sameer Bundela are here to make your woes go away.
From your closet
“Getting into a costume for Halloween isn’t always about going all out. When you run out of time or ideas, you just have to expand your range. Pick characters that are less demanding,” says Pardiwalla. Talking about how you can pick things out from your closet, or use things around the house to patch up a costume in no time, she says, “The number of things you can do with basic clothes is endless; you could pick a black hoodie or cloak and be a grim reaper, you could throwback an easy Harley Quinn costume with make-up and dual tone hairspray to mock the dead trend from last year.”
Bundela points out that one can dress up as any character from The Addams Family. “Characters have fairly common clothes but with a bit of make-up and tweaking, you can get instant results,” he says, to which Pardiwalla adds, “You can dress as Wednesday and Pugsley Addams. It’s easy and can be done with a back dress and an undershirt and it fits the theme of Halloween beautifully. If you think there are very less spooky characters you relate to and know of, think beyond and dress up as corpse versions of characters that aren’t necessarily scary.”
Bundela made the costume of Freddy Kreuger, a character of the A Nightmare on Elm Street film series, in a day. “I chose this character because I love the movies and while he is very easily recongnisable and fun to portray because of his vamp nature, he’s also fairly easy to make. I used gloves with cardboard, joined together with glue and rivets which you can get at any hardware store. The rest of the costume includes a bowler hat, and a stripped cardigan. I didn’t know how to do gory make-up or prosthesis at the time, so I just took women’s stalking and put them on my face in layers and randomly painted over it with red paint,” he shares.
Be imaginative
Pardiwalla recalls how she dressed up as a flapper girl from The Great Gatsby and gave it a scary twist with zombie makeup. “I only wore a white one piece and make-up and I fit right into the party,” she says, adding, “You must know, casual cosplays are a thing! So if you cannot whip up a full costume, visualise your character and change their costume to fit modern settings. For example, imagine Frankenstein in a high school setting, what would he wear?”
Another suggestion by her is to try out mummy costumes. “Wrap parts of your body in medical gauze rolls and use red food colouring for blood,” she says.
Bundela recommends becoming a vampire for the night. “You can just apply a lot of powder on your face to make it white, use a little make up here and there and voila! You’re ready to suck fresh blood,” says he, adding, “Google is your friend. There are a lot of examples you can find online, on Instagram or Pinterest.”
Trends this year
Pardiwalla feels that this year Halloween parties will see a lot of Pennywise cosplays (the clown from Stephen King’s IT). “I think with people getting more unconventional ideas, we may end up having people dressed as phobias too. I want to see people get creative and channel their fears and take a walk around town in them this year,” she says.
Bundela adds that Star Wars and Marvel characters have always been the most popular choices for Halloween costumes. “Since everyone is excited about the releases by Marvel, and a film from the Star Wars franchise also came out earlier this year, I won’t be surprised to see lot of Jedis, Siths and Thors,” he says.
