Scary Scarecrow Costume

Okay, so I am a huge fan of Halloween. I consider myself to be a Halloween enthusiast, lol! With the success of my homemade mummy costume last year, I committed to making my own Halloween costumes from now on. This year, I came up with a “Scary Scarecrow” costume concept. I want to keep the “classic Halloween characters” theme going on. Well, I sketched up something very creepy and started collecting any and all materials I would need. I am so glad I did made this costume myself, because it was SO inexpensive! All I purchased was a cheap plastic mask (to give form for my scarecrow face under the burlap, rope and twine, white contact lenses, and FABRIC, (two shades of burlap for the head and body, very cheap, and another brown linen fabric to make my gloves and boot covers). The only items I didn’t make myself were the hat (which is actually the sorting hat from Harry Potter, lol, double win!) and the sickle. I did, however, add my own touch on the sickle, wrapping leftover fabric and twill to make it look a little realer. Here’s how I made the costume, step by step.

The body: this was probably the easiest part. I took the measurements of my upper body and cut enough fabric to sew together to make the shirt. The back of the shirt was where I entered from, held together with strips of Velcro I sewed on. Once it was done, I added a patch of lighter colored burlap to give it the scarecrow look. For the sake of fashion, I also added pleather elbow patches, haha.

The gloves/boots: this was a little challenging for me since I really had no idea how boots/gloves are made, lol. The gloves were easier. I just traced my hands (with pointy fingertips) cut them out, and loosely stitched them together to have a creepy look. The boots were difficult. Nonetheless, through trial and error, I measured/traced/cutout the side profile of the boots and stitched those together on top of the pleather soles I cut out. All the bourbon colored pleather on the costume was leftover from when I created my costume for Comic Con ( I was scarlet spider). Very resourceful! Anyways, the last touch I added onto the boots was the corn leaves. I’m Puerto Rican and one Puerto Rican meal consists of wrapping something in corn leaf and boiling it. So I was just fortunate to find this in my house. I cut several strips of the corn leaves and hot glued them into the lining of the boots and gloves.

The head: This was by far the funnest part of the costume to make. It was so cool watching it slowly come to life! I cut the plastic mask I bought in half (from the nose down was removed so my actual mouth can show through the mask). I then spray painted it flat black so the glimmer wouldn’t show (the mask was originally a shiny orange pumpkin face). Then, I hot glued the burlap on top of the plastic mask, giving it an “angry face” shape. Next, after carefully measuring the fit of the mask, I cut a slit down the back (as well as cut off any excess burlap) then stitched Velcro on the back to hold it together. This was how I put the mask on and took it off. I then cut holes in the eyes and mouth, and added little details of yarn here and there to give the mask some character. Done!

Now accessorize: Lastly, all I needed to do was put everything together and accessorize. I put another burlap patch onto my own pants. The “noose tie” was an idea I got from one of the original Batman comics ( “The Scarecrow” used to wear a noose around his neck in order to prevent the inhalation of his hallucinogetic gas). I knew how to tie the knot because I learned how to tie a whole bunch of knots while I was in the Marines. The hat was literally just the sorting hat from Harry Potter, lol, but the straps for the hat really helped keep my face in position. The sickle was purchased from Spirit Halloween (I was surprised they had such a cool prop!). I added leftover burlap and twine to make it look creepier and then splattered leftover fake blood on the blade. The last thing I had to do was put on my contacts/makeup. I painted my entire face black and blended the black into the eye sockets of the mask. With the contacts on I looked very creepy.

Something odd….

Now this is something that I can’t necessarily explain but it was very creepy/cool. No matter what, every time I donned my scary scarecrow mask, I couldn’t help but break out in a wide, eerie smile and start cackling! It helped with the “performance” of the costume but I just found it interesting how, with a costume on, a person can change into an entirely different person!

Hope you guys liked it!Happy Halloween!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_ygc4KeMh0&feature=youtu.be