DIY Bitcoin Halloween costume
It’s always fun to take a hot topic and apply it to a Halloween costume. At least, I think that’s fun. So I thought, let’s make a Bitcoin costume!
Step 1: Gather your supplies
What you need: Some large old Amazon shipping boxes, brown baking paper, metallic spray paint, duck tape, double sided tape, glue, a blade knife, a pen, a nail and about 8 hours of your life.
Step 2. Cut three discs
If you don’t find your high-school compass this can be challenging, but no worries, I’ve got you covered. Try to find a circular object in your home and use that as a guide. Unfortunately my coffee table was too large and my trash can too small, so I had to be inventive and made a simple compass out of cart board. The size of the discs is up to your you, I went for 24 inch diameter. You need three of these discs, two exactly the same acting as the front and back panel, and one that will act as the ring for the front. I made the ring 2.5 inches wide.
Step 3: Cut out the Bitcoin logo
Download the Bitcoin logo (use this direct link to the SVG version on Wikipedia). I imported the SVG file in Sketch (Adobe Illustrator would do too), rotated the graphic 18 degrees to make the ‘B’ stand up straight (not really necessarily but easier to position) and exported the graphic to PDF and put the file on a thumb drive. Then I walked to Kinko’s and asked the guy at the counter to print it on something larger than Letter format. I ended up with the Bitcoin logo exactly 24 inches high. This print will be used as a stencil so the quality of paper doesn’t matter.
Transfer the shape of the Bitcoin logo over to new piece of cart board with pen and cut it out with a blade knife.
Step 4: Construct the sides
This step is a bit time consuming and not the most fun to do. But a coin wouldn’t look like a coin without depth, right? So stop whining and start cutting out two strips of about 4 inches wide. Draw two lines 2 inches from the side and make an incision with your blade knife, but don’t cut through the cart board! You want to fold the strip alongside this incision, and then cut away little triangles about 2 inches from each other.
Once you have completed the strips, bend them and tape them with duck tape to the back panel (disc). I intentionally made these strips shorter than the full circle so I had two gaps which I used to hang a strap (and store my sword).
Step 5: Glue the front to the back panel
I’ve attached the sides to the back panel with duck tape but used (wood) glue to attach the front panel (disc + ring + Bitcoin logo). I couldn’t use glue for the back, because the sides were bending and glue wouldn’t dry fast enough to keep things in place.
You need some time to let the glue dry, like an hour or so. Additionally you need to apply pressure to keep things tight. A variety of gourds — from your recent pumpkin patch visit — are ideal for this, and home made candles as well. For the best results you may need to empty some bottles of liquor first.
Step 6: Pretty up the sides
The sides of the coin look ugly, I know. You can clearly see the wafer pattern of the cart box, the duct tape etc. I found some baking paper in my kitchen which matched the color of the cart board and cut a strip which I used to finish off the sides. Simply apply double sided tape to the strip and stick to the sides. Cut away whatever sticks out.
Step 7: Spray the coin with metallic paint
At Blick I bought an 8 oz can of spray paint from Krylon for $8. I went for Premium Metallic Copper Brilliance and it came out pretty well! The paint didn’t play nice with the baking paper on the side, so you may want to use some other type of paper for that.
Step 8: Make a zigzag sword
Bitcoin as a costume isn’t very interactive, that’s why I decided to make an additional prop, a zigzag ‘curve’ sword representing the ups and downs of Bitcoin’s value. This sword allows you to interact with people asking whether Bitcoin will go up or down. You can also poke people with it or fight with other cryptocurrencies which you may come across at your local Halloween party.
Remember the openings we left in the sides? Comes out handy, you can now store the sword in your coin, how cool is that?!
Step 9: Hanging the coin around your neck
You’ll need to be creative here. I still had a strap laying around from an iPad cover and used that one. It nicely clipped around the openings at the sides of the coin. You can also use a cord or whatever rocks your boat. But remember, if you’re going to wear this costume for a couple of hours you want a strap that is comfortable around your neck!
Step 10: Take a selfie and tag #bitcoinhalloween
Take a selfie in your bedroom mirror and upload the photo on Instagram with the tag #bitcoinhalloween and win one Bitcoin! Just kidding! ;)
Step 11: Cash in!
After going out as Bitcoin on the night of October 28th, Bitcoin surged to a record height of $6,190. So, you may want to buy some coins before you hit that party and cash in after.
