Martha Stewart responds to Halloween costume uproar after dressing as homeless person
Lifestyle mogul and TV presenter Martha Stewart has responded to the furore after an image of her dressed as a homeless person for Halloween was posted to her Instagram account then quickly deleted.
The image showed Stewart dressed in ripped jeans and a ragged cardigan, with her face smudged, holding a sign with the message, “I am hungry help me!!” and was among several images in a carousel promoting her range of candles, sold via US shopping network QVC.
“My QVC candles are perfect for Halloween!!!” the images were captioned.
The image of her costume was screenshot by social media users and widely circualted, prompting a backlash, to which she responded early Monday morning (AEDT).
However in her statement to the New York Post’s Page Six column, the 85-year-old stopped short of apologising.
“I am distressed that my Halloween costume yesterday, which was intended to bring more awareness to the very serious subject of homelessness, has offended people, which was never my intention,” she said in the statement on Monday morning (AEDT).
“Homelessness continues to remain one of America’s greatest challenges and ongoing crises, something that I care deeply about and I have spent a significant amount of time and effort supporting charities that combat this ongoing social epidemic.
“I am committed to continuing to make a difference,” she said.
Stewart has amassed a reported $570 million fortune through her lifestyle and homewares empire.
Celebs embrace Halloween spirit
Also getting buzz for her Halloween costume was supermodel Heidi Klum, who dressed as a giant, severed hand for her annual Halloween party in New York on Saturday (US time), 25 years after she began hosting the much-anticipated event.
Klum was unrecognisable, with only her eyes and mouth showing, blood dripping from her mouth as she stuck her tongue out. The top of the hand ended in a gory assortment of dangling ligaments and tendons. She had an ensemble of helpers in blood-stained hazmat suits.
The idea came to her last year to be a giant hand — specifically her own left hand, with long red nails, a thumb ring, and her engagement ring and wedding band.
“I looked at my hand and I thought, ‘Hey, I think I could fit my body in this somehow,’” Klum said.
It’s not the first time she has gone viral with a wild Halloween costume.
The supermodel-turned-TV personality went viral in 2022 when she arrived at the party on the end of a fishing line, encased in a slithering worm costume.
In past years, Klum has come dressed as the Greek myth Medusa, a peacock, a 2.4-metre-tall “Transformer,” a werewolf from Michael Jackson’s Thriller music video, a clone accompanied by several Klum-lookalikes, and Kali, the multiarmed Hindu goddess of death and destruction.
Klum said it took about five to six hours to get into her hand costume this year, but making it took a lot longer. She posted hints on her Instagram earlier in the day as bloodied prosthetics were applied to her face.
“Hands down, the hardest thing is carrying it,” Klum said. “It’s quite heavy.”
Her husband, musician Tom Kaulitz, did not attend this year because he was on tour. But the details on her costume include a tattoo of his name on her ring finger, along with her palm lines and veins.
“A little bit of Tom is with me,” she said.
Her guests also made a splash with their costumes. Neil Patrick Harris and husband David Burtka arrived as ghoulish twins, while UK singer Jade Thirwall seemed to have dressed as an angle statue that had clearly seen better times.
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