Costume party Totally Explained

Everything about Fancy Dress totally explained

A costume party (American English) or a fancy dress party (British English), mainly in contemporary Western culture, is a type of party where guests dress up in a costume.

United States

Costume Parties are especially popular in the United States around Halloween, when teenagers and adults who may be considered too old for trick-or-treating attend a costume party instead. Halloween costume parties are occasionally featured in popular movies, such as Mean Girls.
Costume parties are also popular during the Carnival season, such as at Mardi Gras. Costume parties are also held for popular science fiction and fantasy events, movie openings and book releases. Website theonering.net held a The Lord of the Rings dress Oscar party that was attended by Peter Jackson. Star Wars parties were held to celebrate the opening of Episode I. Many bookstores have held Harry Potter themed parties to celebrate the releases of the series' later novels, and some movie theaters have had Potter-themed celebrations as the movie adaptations have been released.
Larger scale 'parties' are often related to organised societies or conventions

Fancy Dress parties in Britain

The origins of fancy dress parties in the UK can in some respects be traced to masked balls of the 18th Century period, although Fancy Dress parties of the modern kind are a largely Victorian conception expanded upon by the Edwardians Notable amongst early events in the 20th Century was the Chelsea Arts ball. Such events were often elaborate affairs and for the most part confined to those with considerable means.
Amongst the general population, costume parties also occurred with increasing frequency from the late 1940's onward, although for the most part the costumes were simple affairs until the mid 70's. Prior to 'cheap' costume imports from the Far East (late 1990's) most costumes were either hired, or home constructed. Retail purchased costumes is in respect of the UK, a largely modern phenomenon (late 1990's onward) although 'accessory' items had been available for some time. Coupled with the modern trend in costume parties, 'retro' fashion as a costume theme (such as a 70's or even 80's night) are also popular in the UK, the costumes to some extent parodying or pasticheing the fashions of earlier decades.
[[Image:Martinwolverine.jpg|thumb|300px|A man dressed as the X-Men anti hero Wolverine on Boxing Day 2006 in Wigan. Boxing Day in Wigan is a popular venue for revellers in] fancy dress

]
Fancy dress parties are popular year round in the UK. Bridget Jones features the popular and classic theme "Tarts and Vicars". Fancy dress parties are also a favorite of the British Royal Family. Prince William celebrated his 21st birthday with an "Out of Africa" theme, Princess Beatrice chose an 1888 themed party for her 18th birthday, and Freddie and Gabriella Windsor celebrated a joint birthday party with a pre-French Revolution courtly theme. Prince Harry infamously wore an Afrika Corps uniform with a Nazi armband to a "Colonials and Natives" themed party in January 2005. There was a large international outcry after the Sunday tabloid News of the World published a photo of him in the costume. There are lots of different shops and websites which sell fancy dress

, of which one of the main ones is http://www.fancydressking.co.uk/

Japan

In Japan, costume parties are closely related to the cosplay phenomenon.

Further Information

Get more info on 'Fancy Dress'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://costume_party.totallyexplained.com">Costume party Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.