I decided this year I was finally going to pull off the headless bride costume. But I needed to make it easy to make and affordable as well as easy to maneuver in. I’ve seen it done but I added a few extras that I think make it not only stand out but pop as well. The costume took me about a week to complete and used only what I had lying around the house or what I could find, I refuse to pay a lot for a costume. It seems like there is a lot needed to make but as I’ll explain, anything lying around the house can work . Things I used to make costume:

A wedding dress, (I found mine in the trash after yard sales closed down, you can find cheap at good will or yard sales)

T-Shirt

pins

Newspaper and/or batting

Any type of material for veil

Tubing

Squirt gun or anything that acts as a squeeze ball

Duct Tape

Fishing line

Cardboard

Coffee can (smaller size)

white Glue

Gauze

Grey silicone

2 wooden dowels

Backpack frame or any harness, or belts

Fake flowers

Old jewelry

Oatmeal

Fake blood
Balloons

Step 1: Starting the Costume

Step 1

Take a T-shirt and pin inside upper portion of the wedding dress. Then take newspaper or batting, whichever both work, and filled T-shirt while inside dress, this ensures torso will fit properly into the dress after hard cast is made. ( Trust me this is the best way to begin the upper body cast, I tried duct taping my own upper body but after paper mache it did not fit in the dress, the method above ensures the fit and is so much easier).

Step 2
Take out stuffed T-shirt from a wedding dress, and begin duct taping the entire T-shirt. Take coffee can and drill a hole in center of bottom of the can. Then place on top of the newspaper in T-shirt and continue duct taping making sure it is all covered.

Step 3
Once the entire torso is covered in duct tape take the white glue mixture and guaze and begin paper mache. Make sure to cover the entire torso and neck area, to build strength. I like this method better than newspaper because the newspaper is very hard and can possibly not fit in dress since paper mache adds a few inches to torso, and it's not flexible for placing in dress. The guaze method provides strength and flexibility. The mixture recipe is 1 cp white glue to 1/2 cp warm water. Make sure to let dry throughly and add a little bit of salt to paper mache mixture to keep mold from forming. I only did two coats and worked well for me.

Step 2: Building the Costume

Step 4

Once the paper mache torso is dry I took a caulk gun and found masonry silicone (light grey) lying around the house, if you don’t have that home depot sells pretty cheap. and coated the torso and smoothed out with an old credit card. It is easy to work with and when dry it looks and has the feel of dead flesh. It is also very easy to maneuver and also holds dress in place. Let dry I placed mine in front of a fan and dried within a few hours.

Step 5

Take out newspaper in torso and run tubing through torso. I ran mine through the neck down through the torso and then refill torso with newspaper if you choose, I did for a little more support then sewed the torso shut, (make sure to leave room for wooden dowels). Attach the tubing to a squeeze ball or squirt gun, I used a rubber heart Halloween prop, It had a hole in top that fit my tubing. Don’t fill with fake blood until you are going to wherever your showing off costume. The tubing i used is hospital grade tubing for an oxygen tank any tubing will work.

Step 6

Then I searched my house for a backpack frame, you can use a regular backpack if you don’t have a frame or a harness even regular belts will work for this next step. I took the two wooden dowels (mine were about 2ft long) and duct taped to the frame. Then the upper parts of dowels I took fishing line and sewed the dowels to the inside of torso (to the T-shirt that is still inside). ***NOTE I also used another belt around frame around my chest so I could dance and costume remained very stable. Then place dress over torso, works best if laid on the ground.

Step 6

Step 3: Building the Costume

Step 7

I then made slits in dress so I could put my hands through so I could drink. I tacked the slits so the seams didn’t come apart in the dress. I also laid on floor with dress and marked and cut a hole for my head to slip through. I also added batting to long opera gloves and attached them to dress arms with thread.

Step 8.

I then took old curtains and attached with white glue, you can sew or use hot glue to attach to a head band. Make a slit up the middle of veil.

Step 9

I then took balloons and tore them up, dipped in fake blood and glued to the top of the severed neck. Then I made a mixture of white glue, oatmeal, and fake blood. Place mixture on top of the severed neck, gives a great rotting chopped flesh look. Then I took a shoe lace and glue around top of neck for a neck bone.

Step 4: Building the Costume

Step 10

For the top of the tubing I got lucky, I went to my local halloween store and explained my costume. They gave me a piece from a broken prop that squirts blood. I attached it to top of tubing on top of neck and painted it red to make it look like an artery. If you can't get that piece you can use a faucet screen cut to size and fold over tubing and glue onto tubing, make sure to use a glue that can withstand moisture.

Step 11I you have any fake flowers like I did, tie them all together and cover in blood for a deadly bouquet. If you don’t have any fake flowers dead flowers, sticks or leaves from outside tied together work just as well.Step 12

Take a glass bowl and pour some fake blood in it and I put rubber gloves on dipped my fingers in and splattered blood all down the costume. As for the blood on the upper torso, I had to coat several times those areas and because the silicone doesn’t let paint or fake blood stick well, but after a few coats looks more realistic.

Step 13

For the face, I coated my face with pale cream then baby powder. I then darkened my eyes with dark shadow and used concealer on my lips then applied blue and black lines with eyeliner and patted into lips. I took white glue and patted some areas of the face and added rasin bran and painted with painted with fake blood.

Step 5: Finalizing Costume

That’s it! It is a little time consuming but well worth the outcome. I am very proud of this costume and it only cost me $5.99 for the fake blood. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!!!!