My husband and I were invited to a Charlie & the Chocolate Factory Theme Party. The hosts sent out brilliant invitations which were chocolate bars which had been decorated with printed “Wonka Bar” wrappers and each contained a golden ticket under the wrapper.
We decided to attend as “Homemade No Sew Oompa Loompa Costumes”. Our costumes were entirely homemade, but without sewing a stitch!
To make them, I first purchased a remnant of white fabric ($2) and white colored duck tape($4) at a hobby & craft shop. (The white duck tape was a critical part of our costume!)
For the shirts, I found brown turtlenecks for $9.99 each at a “Sports & Outdoor” shop. I cut some strips of the duck tape to half the width of the roll and used these to create the white stripes on the turtleneck collar and cuffs.
Next, I took the white fabric remnant and cut it into long strips which were about 4-inches wide. I tucked/folded the cut edges of these strips back on both sides and affixed full-width strips of white duck tape down the length of the back of them. These formed the suspenders.
I found 2 pairs of matching white pants on a women’s clearance rack (about $12 each). We attached the suspenders to the pants at front & back with safety-pins. To “puff out” the pants around the knee, we inserted some repurposed inflated air-packaging bags. Then we tucked the pant-legs into brown knee-socks which I found at a discount store for $1.49 a pair. We then decorated the knee-socks using more of the half-width strips of duck tape.
I found our white stretchy gloves at a discount store for 99 cents a pair.
For the wigs, I bought some kelly green copy paper at an office supply store. I made a “cap” for the wigs by placing a trimmed plastic grocery bag on our heads and covering that with masking tape to form a fitted skull-cap. After shaping the cap, I trimmed it and placed it on a head of lettuce (which formed a nice base for attaching the “hair”). I took sheets of the green paper and started cutting them into strips. Then I taped these green paper strips into rows on the back and sides of the cap, making my way up to the crown, where I created the effect of a “center part”. I then used the edge of my scissors to go around the cap and curl the green “paper hair” outwards (the same way you curl ribbon on a gift) so it would flip out on the sides and I made one row stick up at the top right above the bangs.
To finish off the look, we used orange face-paint, which we applied evenly to the face and neck using a moist make-up wedge. I then applied white zinc oxide cream to our eyebrows.
Voila – easy no-sew Oompa Loompa costumes for about $30 each – they were a hit at this theme party and we had so much fun wearing them! You can see in the photo that our hosts went all-out with a “chocolate room” complete with chocolate fountain.
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