Here at Channel Islands High School, we are always in spirit for the holidays, including Halloween, when we’ve been holding costume contests every year.
This year’s Halloween Costume Contest winners were Jerrel Lata for Most Scary, Jewel Thompson for Most Creative, and Elizabeth Abarientos for Best Overall Costume. More than 15 students at CI were competing in these categories, all with very different and unique costumes. This made it difficult for the judges to select which ones would win.
“Heavy Pressure. They’re all good and I hate picking one out of another,” said Mr. David Cole, one of the judges.
The first costume category that was competing was the Most Scary. After careful consideration and deliberation, the judges decided that Jigsaw was the scariest out of the costumes in that category (Ghostface and a plague doctor). The person behind the costume was Lata, a senior making the best out of his last year at CI.
When asked his opinions on the other contestants, Lata said, “They did well…But I would give some suggestions if you are wanting to win the next costume contest…”
One of his suggestions was to dress up in full costume and not regular clothing. In Lata’s junior year, he also won the Halloween costume contest for the same category. When going into this year’s contest he decided to say “Why not” and went a second time inspired by the recent horror movie, Saw X.
In the second category, the Most Creative costume went to Thompson, a junior. Who dressed up as Steve Harvey. She was inspired by TikToks she had seen of girls dressing up as Steve Harvey for Spirit Week at other schools. Her costume helped her win because of its originality. The judges were impressed by the effort that had to be made to create this costume.
“I got a suit from my grandpa and then I already had my wig cap…and put it all together in an hour,” Thompson stated.
Mr. Cole admired this costume because the items that were incorporated into the costume gave it originality from being made out of items you would be able to find at home. This characteristic applies to the overall Best Costume for this year’s contest.
The overall best costume was granted to Abrientos, a freshman. Abrientos was given this title because of the effort, creativity, and individuality of her costume. Her costume was the lovable robot Wall-E from Disney’s movie Wall-E, which came out in 2008. She was inspired while watching the movie and suddenly got the idea when she saw a cardboard box.
“I looked up some Wall-E costumes and I didn’t really like it so I searched up Wall-E 360 and grabbed a box and started painting,” Abrientos states.
This process took her about eight hours to complete.
When asked how she felt after winning overall best costume, she said, “I felt honored because I’m glad the judges knew who I was instead of assuming I was a box.”
The unique and intriguing details of these costumes made it difficult to only choose a few to be recognized. Some honorable mentions are the Maids that won Best Duo, the Homer Simpson costume, Ronald McDonald, and the Eric Cartman inflatable costume because of their uniqueness.
