Fall Decor

Each month, Michaels challenges its Michaels Makers bloggers—a group of D.I.Y. and lifestyle influencers—to design a project according to a specific theme, trend, or season, such as D.I.Y. pumpkins using the company's hollow craft ones. The doughnut pumpkin from the DIY Playbook features a nine-inch white craft pumpkin with painted frosting and sprinkles.

Stacks of pumpkins were carved to resemble the New York cityscape at an Old Navy pop-up event in the meatpacking district in October 2009.

Professional pumpkin carver Hugh McMahon carved jack-o'-lantern-style pumpkins to resemble various celebrities, along with the president and first lady, at the Old Navy event.

In Los Angeles in October 2014, Weight Watchers hosted a dinner featuring a long wooden table accented by pumpkins and fall foliage.

A team of artists carve more than 7,000 pumpkins, creating elaborate designs such as a giant spiderweb, as part of the Great Jack O’ Lantern Blaze, located at the Van Cortlandt Manor in Croton-on-Hudson, New York.

The Halloween extravaganza drew more than 115,000 visitors last year. This year, new creations include an immersive pumpkin planetarium and circus ghost train, featuring clowns, animals, and other colorful characters. Plus, artists can be found carving on site. The Blaze runs through November 15; adult tickets cost $20 ($25 for Saturday visits) and $16 ($20 on Saturdays) for children ages 3 to 17. Advance tickets are required.

Turn seasonal gourds into festive signage using chalkboard pumpkins, marquee lights, and directions from the Crafting Chicks: Trace letter shapes onto the pumpkins, drill a few holes, add lights, and string cord through the hollow bottom of the craft pumpkin.

In September 2014, Pottery Barn Kids threw a Halloween bash at the Mondrian Los Angeles and used mini pumpkins to promote the event's hashtag, #LoveMyPBK.

Pumpkins served as festive vases for succulents at the Pottery Barn Kids event.

Gold confetti pumpkins from Homey Oh My only require three supplies—a pumpkin, scissors, and Washi tape.

An oversize carved pumpkin, fabricated by Daddy-O Productions, helped advertise Fox 5's nightly airings of ABC's comedy Modern Family in Union Square Park in October 2014.

Pumpkins were branded with tune-in information, along with the logo of Union Square Partnership, a partner of the public activation.

A hamburger pumpkin from Shrimp Salad Circus includes "lettuce, tomato, and cheese" made from corrugated cardboard, foam, and heavy paper.

Shawn Feeney’s studio, the Invisible Underground, has created works of art for the White House, including a skeleton constructed from three white pumpkins in 2011.

A simple, seasonal centerpiece from a Pumpkin and a Princess was created by adding faux florals.

For Halloween, the Lollipop Brew at the Sugar Factory American Brassiere in Miami Beach comes dressed up with gummy snakes, spiders, and brains, along with lollipops and a candy necklace. The cocktail, which is served year-round minus the extra creepy crawlies, contains a wicked mix of Monin cantaloupe syrup, Bacardi coconut rum, Ketel One Citroen, grenadine, and pineapple juice.

For Capital C's holiday party in December 2009, the Martini Club in Toronto created a series of fairy-tale-theme cocktails, including a drink called Santa's Beard made with white chocolate liqueur and peppermint and garnished with crushed candy cane.

The Turquoise Fairy at the Capital C party included vodka shaken with passion fruit liqueur and fresh lemonade and was rimmed with colorful blue sugar crystals.

To modernize an old-fashioned, BLT Steak Atlanta infuses Whistle Pig bourbon with Werther’s Original hard candies and combines it with sweet vermouth and aromatic bitters. A bourbon-macerated cherry and a crushed sea salt rim garnish the drink.

The seasonal Pumpkin Soufflé Martini at the Sugar Factory American Brassiere features Stoli vanilla vodka and Godiva white chocolate liqueur and is garnished with a pinch of pumpkin pie spice, whipped cream, and pumpkin-spice-flavored Hershey's Kisses.

As an homage to surrealist artist René Magritte, guests sipped on "Magritte-Ahhs," a concoction of cotton-candy clouds, tequila, agave, and lime-kaffir salt at the Woman's Board and Board of Trustees gala in June 2014 at the Art Institute of Chicago.

For a sweet twist on a simple cocktail, BLT Steak Atlanta mixes Red Vine-infused Stoli vodka with club soda and garnishes the glass with a strawberry and strands of the licorice candy.

The vintage ice cream parlor theme of Washingtonian magazine's annual AT&T's Best of Washington party, held at the National Building Museum in July 2012, inspired the blue rock candy drink stirrers in the signature cocktail, which was called the AT&Tini.

At the after-party for The Walking Dead’s Season 4 premiere in Los Angeles in October 2013, costumed zombies posed for photo ops with guests.

In September 2013, Target launched its Halloween wig collection by designer Chris March with a ghoulish bash at the Angel Orensanz Foundation for the Arts in New York. Hatch Creative Studio’s tabletop decor incorporated pieces from the retailer’s line of Halloween-theme products and home decor items. At the head of each table sat a spooky guest: a plastic skeleton.

In June, Chicago’s Revolt Events and Pure Kitchen Catering teamed up for a Halloween-theme photo shoot, where decorative accents included blood-red-and-black floral arrangements ­comprising scarlet ranunculus and red banana leaf; the ­flowers were arranged in a ­geometric vase.

Revolt Events and Pure Kitchen Catering also prepared bourbon-caramel apples with crushed peanuts on sticks.

Revolt Events and Pure Kitchen Catering presented seasonal eats, which included pumpkin-bisque shooters with cinnamon-vanilla cream and fried sage, with haunting dinner companions—skull napkins.

Spook guests by placing prop skulls or scary masks in unexpected places. At the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in Los Angeles in October 2013, Veuve Clicquot passed flutes of Yellow Label at its Yelloween party, which featured a liquor cabinet decked with startling tropes.

In October 2013, Chicago-based advertising agency Leo Burnett hosted an in-office Halloween bash. The party served office-friendly snacks, including a pumpkin-shaped cheese ball from Simply Elegant Catering.

Along the path to the in-office Leo Burnett bash, which had a bad-luck theme, designers from Art of Imagination placed black paper cat cutouts on the walls of the hallway.

Billed as a “skeletal spectacle,” Redmoon Theater’s 2012 Halloween party in Chicago featured dozens of the bony Halloween icons, and planners created unique ways to combine food and entertainment. At a s’mores station, two performers in lingerie and face makeup warmed chocolates over candles in a bathtub; blowtorches were used to melt the marshmallows.

At Keep a Child Alive’s “Dream Halloween” event at the Barker Hangar in Los Angeles last October, a display of oversize orange and green balloons mimicked the look of a giant pumpkin for a kid-friendly take on decor.

At last year’s “Galaween” event at the Chicago Cultural Center, Event Creative built a lavish, haunted-house-style entrance. This year, the agency’s designer Jeffrey Foster predicts that parties will take a glitzy turn with lace-covered pumpkins, silver or gold ­skeletons, marabou witches, or bejeweled or glittered skulls.