How To Create Pennywise Costume

When my son told me he wanted to be Pennywise from Stephen King's "IT", I did one quick Google search and learned that I was easily looking at a $100+ costume that I knew he would wear for *maybe* 2 hours– NOPE. Not happening. So I decided I would channel my inner Martha and would whip up a DIY kids Pennywise costume for less– like WAY less.

Of course, between being busy with all the other "Mom" things and also being a professional procrastinator who loves a good adrenaline rush of working under pressure, I put this plan off until the very last minute and did as I always do– called on my reliable and resourceful BFF, Amazon Prime.

I sourced the entire Pennywise costume from Amazon Prime for a fraction of the cost of the official "IT" costume– and you guys, I am still in awe of how CREEPY and amazing IT turned out; especially given that I threw it together in less than a week!

I want to tell you I'm just super crafty and talented, but trust this was put together with nothing more than a hot glue gun, Prime membership and a prayer.

That being said, I am asked how I made this DIY Pennywise kids costume all the time, so I thought I'd finally put it into a post (no doubt there will be lots of kids looking to be Pennywise this year with the sequel in theaters!)

EASY DIY KIDS PENNYWISE DIY COSTUME

LAST MINUTE KIDS PENNYWISE COSTUME DIY

Disclosure: This post includes Amazon affiliate links. When you make a purchase through the links in this post, I may make a small commission from the sale.

How To Make A DIY Pennywise Costume For Kids This Halloween

(even at the last minute)

Side note: If you are a busy mom like me and do not have an Amazon Prime subscription– it is worth its weight in gold. I mean it. Get it today or at the very least put it on your Holiday wish list!

In total this simple DIY costume was under $50 for me because I had some of the materials already. I am going to link to all of the items below so that you know what I used exactly but note that you won't need entire packages for some- ie: red poms, balloons and balloon sticks. As with any DIY, the key is to be scrappy and resourceful. You may be able to ask friends and family if they have those types of things around or even check out your local dollar store or Walmart for smaller packages than what is offered on Amazon.

Materials

(See my full handy dandy Amazon shopping list here)

White clown wig-skin
Orange/ Red wig
White peasant top
White leggings
Pearl gray RIT fabric dye
Clown gloves
Red and white bungee cord
Large red poms
Hot glue and glue gun
Red balloon
Balloon stick
Clown Makeup
White clown foundation

Steps:

Create Pennywise's Hair. Cut out the rubber skin on the orange hair wig and glue it to the white clown wig-skin. This took some mastering. I would put it on my sons head, to check for placement and then style with hair spray. — When writing this post, I saw Amazon now has a decent looking Pennywise wig for around $20- (about $5 more than what it cost me to make ours, but depending on your budget and time, you may just want to get that one that is already styled.
Make your Pennywise Clown Collar With Coffee Filters. This was my favorite part because it literally cost around $3 to make all the ruffles and that felt like a huge win considering some of the collars I saw were around $20. To make your coffee filter clown collar make a ring by cutting out the center of a paper plate. Be sure to cut an opening on the ring so you can easily wear it as a costume. Fold your white paper coffee filters in half. Glue them around your paper plate in tiers to make your ruffles.
Dye your peasant top and leggings with your RIT fabric dye.
Add ruffles to the bottom of your leggings and shirt. Just as you did with your coffee filter clown color you are going to create ruffles by gluing tiers of folded coffee filters. I had purchased leggings with a few ruffles on them already but in retrospect that was unnecessary. Any leggings will do when you're making the ruffles with coffee filters anyway.
Applying the final details. I added the red poms and rope accents after my son put on the dyed shirt and leggings. I just found it easier to center and fluff. Carefully hot glue 3 large red poms to the center of your shirt. Then using your bungee cord, tie around the waist and sleeves and puff out shirt to make Pennywise's ballooned shirt look.

For the face make up, I highly recommend using a white clown foundation/ liquid latex as your base and then following a great YouTube tutorial like this one to paint on the creepy red smile and black eyes.

Pinterest- Kids DIY Pennywise Costume For Less