Clown Costumes vs Clown Costume Accessories

If you are looking to dress up as a clown for Halloween or a party, you can purchase a clown costume that includes most of what you need for the event. But if you want to create a clown character, if you want your own style and personality to make an event truly special and bring a big smile to everyone in the room, then you need clown accessories.

What are clown accessories?

Clown accessories are the many choices you make to put together a final character. They include clothing, such as shoes, socks, suspenders, buttons, gloves, and hats. Clowns pay special attention to their face, so some form of clown face paint or makeup is essential, along with perhaps a clown nose and skullcap or wig. And a unique clown personality will add decorative details to complement that clown persona. Clown pins and jewelry, special glasses or accessories like balloons and magic tricks are other clown accessories to consider.

So many options! Where to start?

It may help to know that there are different ‘traditions’ or ‘types’ of clowns that have developed over many decades and even centuries. You can develop a character within one of those traditions, or for the more adventurous, incorporate different elements of all types.

The white face clown

As the name implies, a Whiteface clown wears white-based facial makeup, like that of a classic circus clown. Despite the artificial coloring, whiteface makeup is not intended to hide, but rather to accentuate, or in some cases exaggerate, the clown’s facial features.

Whiteface clowns generally have one type of costume, but use additional makeup to accentuate feminine facial features.

The male Whiteface clown has several varieties. The classic (European) Whiteface is a jester, wearing soft shoes, baggy pants, a loose-fitting top, a neck frill, and a soft pointed hat. The traditional pointy hat can be replaced by a floppy hat or a black skullcap.

The Straight Whiteface clown also dresses in baggy clothing, but wears either all-white clothing with a colorful trim or multi-colored clothing with contrasting trim and ruff. Typical clown accessories are a cap and a wig.

The Grotesque or Comedy Whiteface clown often has more exaggerated makeup than the Straight Whiteface to reflect a more buffoonish character, as well as irregular body proportions such as long legs on stilts, a large behind, etc. Baggy, but tailored clothing is worn to highlight these irregular proportions and is often colorful, or even mismatched. This type of clown usually wears gloves and a wig among other clown accessories.

the august clown

The classic Auguste Clown may at first glance appear closer to the Grotesque Whiteface than the Classic Whiteface, as the costume is often extravagant, exaggerated, and uneven, sporting bold colors and large prints. Augustes often wears too big or too small clown accessories, such as a big bow tie, a small hat, oversized glasses, pants that are too small, or shoes the size of a boat. Suspenders and gloves are other important accessories for clowns. But the general point about Auguste’s clowns is that there are few absolute wardrobe “rules”, and the character has more leeway as to how to convey the “crazy” of this guy. Auguste’s makeup includes fair face but can maintain partial skin tones and otherwise complements the overall ‘over the top’ look with additional makeup that exaggerates the features.

Feminine Augustas often sport long eyelashes, wear outrageous dresses, and carry handbags.

tramp clowns

Tramps are the most common of another type of clown, sometimes known as a “Character Clown”. In addition to hobos, character clowns may include “cowboy clowns,” “rodeo clowns,” and other types of modern or contemporary professionals such as police officers, firefighters, or nurses.

There are different types of hobos, such as “happy hobo hobo” or “unlucky sad hobo”, but the costume is similar for all of them. A heavily patched dark suit or tuxedo, battered shoes, a wrinkled bowler hat or top hat (often without the top), and fingerless gloves are basic wardrobe components. Hobo clown accessories include brightly colored vests, long dark coats with lots of pockets, and canes. Make-up can include face white, and sometimes “sooty” make-up from an alleged train ride can also be applied to the face. (The “Boom” guy didn’t travel, so he probably wouldn’t have “soot” on his face.)

The bums, called Bag Ladies, typically wear sneakers, a scruffy dress, a cheap scarf or costume jewelry, and a bandana or floppy hat.

So that’s a start to building your clown persona. Whether you want to be a ‘traditional’ type of clown or create a wildly original character, clown accessories are the building blocks for your own clown persona. Good luck and happy Clown!