It’ll come as no surprise to find out that Halloween is an incredibly wasteful holiday. For just one night of fun, joking, food, drink, and costumes, there tends to be a fair bit of waste involved. We want to help out. We’ve created a list of eco-friendly costume ideas that’s perfect for both kids and adults alike!
Scary fact: 90% of families plan on buying a new outfit every year!
So how can we have a more eco-friendly Halloween?
So many commercially available Halloween costumes are made using plastic, and a lot cannot be recycled. Switching up the materials you use in your Halloween outfit is a great step to having an eco-friendly Halloween.
Costumes
Swap costumes with a friend
If you’re in need of a new costume and don’t want to wear what you wore last year, why not switch with your friend. You both get a brand new costume and what could be quite a funny story.
Switching costumes from last year is also great for kids. You can join Facebook groups designed with costume swaps, or if a friend has a little one with a costume, you can switch with them. With all of the amazing costumes purchased each year, there must be so many scary costumes dying to find a new owner.
Consider using things you already have
Some DIY costumes are pretty amazing, however, they don’t need to be difficult or expensive. Consider using some pieces of clothing you already own. Sports jerseys or uniforms can double up as Halloween costumes. Using a uniform you can transform yourself into a pilot, member of the army, or a doctor. You can then add a bit of fake blood and make it a scary version!
Rent a costume
Instead of buying or creating your own costume, why not rent one. You can go to your local fancy dress shop and support a local business, or even get one online! Using a rental costume means more new materials don’t need to be used to create more costumes, thus reducing the carbon footprint of your Halloween costume.
Decorations
Pumpkins
Pumpkins are mostly grown and bought for decoration, then once the fun is over, just dumped into a bin. The really scary part is once they reach a landfill, they ferment and release methane, a greenhouse gas 30 times more potent than carbon dioxide. So don’t bin your pumpkin!
Once you’re done with your pumpkin, you can do a number of things with it; you can add it to a compost where it will naturally biodegrade, or if you don’t have access to one, you could always contact your local allotment and compost your pumpkin there.
Black spider webs
Ditch the fake plastic spider webs and create your own using nothing but black yarn, pipe cleaners, and a pair of scissors. Plus you can reuse all of this the following year – so no need to buy anything new next year.
Follow this quick video tutorial to see how!
Halloween candy!
Eco-friendly Halloween treats
If you’re looking for something more eco-friendly on the sweet treat front, vegan sweets are the way to go. Plant-based sweets tend to be more sustainable as the plant-based ingredients don’t require as much energy to produce or cause as much CO2.
Giving out treats
Trying to buy sweets for the Trick or Treaters and avoiding plastic is a big ask. You can choose to get sweets wrapped in less plastic. Fewer layers of plastic means less waste.
You could also decide to make or bake your own treats. Scary Halloween biscuits make a delightful treat that will certainly put a smile on any child’s face.
Trick or Treat bag
If you’re going out Trick or Treating, we’ve got some great ideas to help make it more environmentally friendly. Instead of going to buy a scary new plastic bucket, why not use something you already own. Tote bags make great bags to carry sweets in, plus you can decorate them in true Halloween fashion. Stick some scary bugs to it, create cobwebs out of wool, or even add some fake blood to it! (Just make sure it washes out after!)