Jack the Pumpkin King Costume

After I spent my first Halloween with my now husband, I knew I had hit the jackpot. I had found someone that loves Halloween as much as I do. Each year we try to out-do the year before. While we usually do something that is recognizable, we love doing costumes that remind us of our childhood and teen years. And if the character is from a movie, we spend the entire time we make the costume watching it over and over again!
We started by going to the fabric store, I was looking for a jacket pattern but instead found a cheap pattern for the suit for Jack Skellington! Getting the jacket just right was very important so we bought the pattern for the suit and were on our way.
The suit was made out of black fabric. The jacket fit perfect! But, the pants were an issue. The pattern was meant to be a high waist pant. However, with my husbands’ build they did not fit properly. Instead we made them to fit at his waist and the created a cummerbund type sash to go over the stomach. The time consuming part was making the pin stripes. Every stripe was hand drawn, making sure that each area dried completely before moving on so that we did not smug the pattern.
The “bat” tie was created using the same fabric from the suit and adding a clay bat head onto it that had been painted black with white eyes. Originally, it was meant to be worn as a tie, but after trying on the complete costume it did not look right, because the head sat too low. Instead, it was pinned to the shirt under the jacket.
Creating the head was the most exciting part. We started by using paper mache around a balloon that we thought my husbands’ head would fit into. After that was completed, we added two layers of fiber glass to make it sturdy. Next, a layer of dry wall spackel, followed by pieces of clay to form the eyes and the mouth. A final layer of spackel, a coat of primer, and white paint and the head was done. To seal the eyes, we spray painted some window screen black and glued it to the inside. So that the head would balance properly while being worn, a hard hat (that we spray painted black) was installed inside of the head.
For zero, we cut a pattern that we liked for the shape of his head, we then made that into a pillow, with a t-shirt type fabric. We attached a large amount of fabric to the head to give it the ghost feel. The ears were made from wire and fabric, and glued to the head. A small LED light was placed in the nose and covered with a small layer of orange paint. To hold him up, we took a thin, long piece of wood and attached it directly under the head. We then stapled parts of the fabric to the wood to make the body have a shape.
We were very excited about the finished product. It even won our small costume contest that our friends host every year. This year we were told multiple times that they don’t know how we will do better next year!