On Friday, Klum, the mannequin and host of “Challenge Runway,” reworked into Medusa, the highly effective monster from Greek mythology mentioned to immediately flip onlookers into stone. (Her husband, musician Tom Kaulitz, dressed as a warrior became stone.)
Yearly, Klum spends months attempting to outshine the array of different costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has turn into one thing of a mainstay in New York Metropolis during the last quarter-century. In years previous, she has dressed as a worm, a peacock, a werewolf, an ogress and E.T., the endearing alien from Steven Spielberg’s 1982 movie. She has additionally dressed as a “clone” of herself and as an older model of herself.
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As Klum posed earlier than photographers, greater than a dozen animatronic snakes appeared to slither from her head, and her eyes glowed with reptilian contact lenses. Her physique was encased in a snake go well with with an almost 8-foot tail, which housed a battery pack for the writhing snakes and a set of wheels so she may wriggle round. Her costume made it troublesome to sit down down and was so giant that she took up a lot of the blue carpet outdoors the Arduous Rock Resort in midtown Manhattan.
Mike Marino, a Hollywood prosthetics designer and Klum’s longtime Halloween collaborator, mentioned her costume this yr was impressed by the snakelike, stop-motion Medusa from the 1981 film “Conflict of the Titans,” designed by Ray Harryhausen, the celebrated animator and special-effects creator.
The mannequin and TV persona Heidi Klum, in costume as Medusa for her annual Halloween occasion, on the Arduous Rock Resort in New York on Friday, Oct. 1, 2025. Yearly, Klum spends months making ready to outshine the array of different costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has turn into one thing of a mainstay in New York Metropolis during the last quarter-century. (Nina Westervelt/The New York Instances)
“Please take a look at these enamel,” Klum mentioned the day earlier than her occasion, highlighting razor-sharp acrylic enamel. “If I chew somebody within the neck, I may truly go for blood.”
“She’ll kill somebody with them,” added Marino, who lately gained an Emmy Award for the prosthetic make-up on the HBO Max sequence “The Penguin.”Story continues beneath this advert
It took a number of dozen folks to carry the whole costume collectively. A scaled masks and gloves lined her face, neck and palms so each inch of her pores and skin was hid; the tiny slivers that peeked by means of have been painted inexperienced. A 5-inch, break up, reptile tongue frolicked of her mouth and was hooked up onto her actual tongue with a “suction cup machine,” Marino mentioned. For it to work, Klum needed to make her personal tongue “as dry as doable,” she mentioned.
The enamel and the tongue did make it cumbersome for Klum to eat a lot all through the night. “That’s why I do all of it now,” Klum mentioned, nibbling away at tagliatelle whereas Marino caught on her Medusa ears with glue hours earlier than she walked onto the pink carpet.
And, Marino mentioned, going to the toilet could be “very troublesome” too. (Klum wore an grownup diaper beneath her go well with.)
Although the German-born mannequin and her elaborate costumes have turn into considerably synonymous with Halloween, earlier this yr she expanded her attain with a spin on Oktoberfest — her first “Heidi Fest” in Munich — and is now contemplating placing the Heidi contact on yet one more vacation: carnival.Story continues beneath this advert
“We do the carnival massive in Germany too,” she mentioned. “Individuals are normally like: ‘Actually? Carnival in Germany?’ However in February, now we have an enormous carnival. Let’s see.”
The mannequin and TV persona Heidi Klum, in costume as Medusa for her annual Halloween occasion, with different friends together with her husband, Tom Kaulitz, middle, dressed as a warrior became stone, on the Arduous Rock Resort in New York on Friday, Oct. 1, 2025. Yearly, Klum spends months making ready to outshine the array of different costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has turn into one thing of a mainstay in New York Metropolis during the last quarter-century. (Nina Westervelt/The New York Instances)
Klum’s crew got here up with the concept of her dressing as Medusa about 4 months in the past, which in her world is extraordinarily late, she mentioned.
When she chosen the costume, Klum mentioned, she was not pondering particularly about Medusa’s place in mythology as a feminine determine who, in some accounts, was sexually assaulted, reworked right into a monster and later beheaded. Classicist Mary Beard has referred to as Medusa “one of the crucial potent historical symbols” of male conquer feminine energy.
“I’ve been taking part in with the concept of Medusa for some time, and I believed, ‘Let’s do Medusa proper,’” Klum mentioned. “She’s only a actually cool, scary, snake-woman.”Story continues beneath this advert
Klum has already discovered what she needs to be subsequent yr as a result of generally, inspiration simply hits “like this,” she mentioned, snapping her fingers, with out giving any hints.
