Homemade Wall-E Costume

Wall-E was the first and only movie that I have taken my daughter to see at the theater. She loved it, and of course she wanted to be Wall-E for Halloween this year. I searched online and found Wall-E costumes for $60, which was way out of my price range, and I wasn’t in love with any of the options available either. So, I decided I would make it myself. I had a lot of fun making the costume, and I’m really pleased with the end result. And, it was so rewarding to see my daughter’s face when she saw it.

How to Make a Wall-E Costume

To make the body, I used two pieces of black foam board that I cut to size using a box knife, and then taped all of the edges with masking tape. To assemble the pieces I used masking tape to tape each piece together along the seems on the outside and inside. Then, I used a scrap piece of card board within each corner on the inside secured with hot glue for stability. I cut arm holes on the sides. For the top of the box I used poster board that will go over my daughters shoulders with a cut out for her head. This too was secured with hot glue, and later resecured with masking tape. I first tried to spray paint the body, but the paint did not apply smoothly and the black from the foam board was not covered completely, so I ended up painting with primer and then before it was dry, started painting over it with my orange craft paint, creating a weathered look. I used a sponge to apply the brown paint around the edges of the body, and used the edge of a piece of cardboard dipped in the paint to create the lines and then smudged. I found the Wall-E words online, copied the image, pasted in PowerPoint and made larger and then printed. Since the image was fuzzy, I went over with markers, cut out the letters, and glued to the body. I then went back over the edges with the brown sponge. I made the “hardware” out of foam sheets, painted gray.

For the eyes, I started with a pair of safety goggles I bought at the dollar store. I cut out each eye from foam core and painted, and then cut out spaces around the eyes so that my daughter can see out of them. I glued to the goggles using hot glue. I purchased all materials at Wal-Mart with the exception of the goggles, and think I ended up spending about $20.

We also made Wall-E’s friend, the roach, that my daughter calls “buggy” out of brown felt and pipe cleaners.

We opted not to make the wheels. For the hands, we used light weight cardboard and and painted and glued strips of foam sheet. We attached to her wrists using a single rubber band for each arm. She started out with the goggles over her eyes, but we moved to her head so that she could see better. Plus, we love seeing her cute face.

Kenzie had a blast for Halloween, and she has already said she wants to be Wall-E again next year.