Heidi Klum Teases Her “Very, Very Gory” 2026 Halloween Costume

Halloween is still months away, but for Heidi Klum, spooky season is already in full swing. When she isn’t gearing up to judge a record-breaking roster of designers on Season 22 of Project Runway this July, the queen of OTT transformations is deep into costume prep for this year. And it sounds like whatever she has planned will land straight in the Heidiween Hall of Fame.

“My Halloween costume is already in the making,” the host and executive producer tells Bustle. “It’s a very complicated one to the point where the maker, in the first week, was like, ‘I don't know if I can do it.’ And I was like, ‘Come on, you’ve said this in the past before.’”

The extreme head-start is all by design. Klum locked in the concept before last year's holiday even rolled around, calling the early brainstorm a “blessing.” Mapping out her path ahead of time saves her from her usual pre-planning stress, leaving the heavy lifting to her long-time prosthetic designer, Mike Marino of Prosthetic Renaissance. “Usually, he can do it because he makes things that haven’t really been done before,” she says.

Believe it or not, this year’s project is poised to raise the bar. “It’s going to be tricky for me and tricky for [Mike] to make, but I think it’s going to be epic. I love it,” she says, before dropping a major clue: “It’s going to be very, very gory.”

A pivot to straight horror marks a bit of tonal shift for the supermodel, who leaned into Greek lore in green scales and a crown of mechanical snakes for her internet-breaking Medusa look in 2025. It was scary, yes, but far from gruesome.

Though Klum’s known for committing to the bit, her looks weren’t always so elaborate. “When I first started, I tried to do a lot of the things myself, especially the makeup,” she says. “Once I figured out there are people who do special effects makeup, I really went for it.” That discovery changed everything: “All of a sudden, my whole horizon opened up. I was like, ‘Whoa, we can do so many crazy things.’ So every year I started thinking about crazier and crazier things.” And every year, everyone keeps up with her costumes and tries to swing an invite to her iconic parties. (Hello, Heidi, @me.)

While the former America’s Got Talent judge insists she loves all her creations, she admits that bringing them to life can easily turn into a test of physical endurance. For instance, her animatronic E.T. ensemble in 2024 required next-level patience. “It was hard to have me be proportionate,” she recalls. “I had to be in a ditch with everyone standing on top so that I was small because E.T. is small.”

When it comes to her absolute favorites, the focus seems to be on theatrical magic over heavy mechanics. Take her hyper-detailed, aged-up 2013 transformation: “I loved it when I turned myself into an old version of myself,” she says. “It was really beautiful to watch. I kept on going in the mirror, and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, it’s me, just older.’”

Her 2023 peacock transformation took things to an even more theatrical level. “I did that together with Cirque du Soleil,” she says, noting that she had to go to Quebec twice to rehearse for the performance.

Ancient myths and acrobatics are great, but if her new teasers are any indication, 2026 is about to be a whole different kind of theater.