With World Book Day coming up in on Thursday 6th March 2025 many are thinking about which of their favourite book characters they will be dressing up as this year. The Reduce and Recycle hub is running a fancy dress costume swap for world book day, offering families the opportunity to donate costumes and/or collect another costume to take home. We also have links to running your own costume swap and inspiration for simple low waste costumes for those that can’t make the costume swap.
On Saturday 1 March, visitors to the Reduce and Recycle hub can take part in a Costume Swap by either taking one costume per person and/or donate an old one for someone else to enjoy. Even if your children aren’t taking part in a world book day dressing up day event but love a costume, please join in the fun and pop along. Invite family and friends so they can enjoy choosing their costume together.
What is World Book Day?
World Book Day is a charity event held annually in the UK on the first Thursday in March. Reading for fun is the single biggest indicator that a child will grow up to enjoy a happier and successful. However, the challenge is that reading is at an all-time low, with only 1 in 3 children now saying they enjoy reading. They believe children are more likely to read if they enjoy it, so they are on a mission to encourage them to see reading as an entertaining, social and fun thing to do. Part of World Book day is schools ask children to dress up as their favorite character.
World Book Day can be an exciting event for children, is a great way to get kids excited about reading and gives the children an opportunity to not wear their school uniform for one day. However, buying a new costume every year can be damaging to the environment, as well as adding to the rising costs of living for families.
For many families producing or purchasing a new costume each year can also put unwelcome financial pressure. Furthermore, many costumes are bought and worn once before being discarded, with most ending up in landfill.
What a waste!
For J&B recycling, who deal with the North East of England household waste disappointed to find fancy dress costumes in their mixed household recycling that comes into their Material Recovery Facility (MRF). We have a similar system here in Ealing so find out what happens to our waste in Ealing and where our recycling is sent to Crayford MRF. Watch Recycling Myths debunked for more information on why its important to get the right thing in the right place.
At MRF recycling sites, they can’t recycle costumes and other similar items. There are many items that Many store-bought fancy dress costumes are made from synthetic materials like polyester. These are difficult to recycle. Additionally, these costumes often include accessories such as masks, wigs, and props made from mixed materials, further complicating the recycling process.
Particularly disheartening is the number of children’s costumes, often in good enough quality to be reused, and sometimes even brand new.
Pictured here is a gorilla mask that gave the J&B quality control team a bit of a fright! Imagine the fun someone could have had with that – it didn’t need to end up in the bin!
Mary Horesh, Manager of the Reduce and Recycle hub commented “There is a lot of waste around kids’ costumes, especially with the growth in popularity of events such as World Book Day. We ran the Halloween Costume swap and the positive response we got was amazing. A city university Media student visited the swap as it was the only sustainable event for Halloween she could find.”
How will the Costume Swap for World Book day work?
At the Reduce and Recycle swaps, you can either give donations, take donations or both. It is all about getting everyone to wear their clothes (and in this case costumes!) for longer.
The Costume swap for World Book Day is free. It will take place on Saturday 1st March from 12 am to 2pm at the Reduce and Recycle Hub, inside St Mary’s Church Acton.
On the day you can choose up to 1 costume per visitor, while stocks last. This is to make sure there’s enough available for everyone. If you have unwanted costumes that are clean drop them off to us on the day until 1 pm.
Acton Reduce and Recycle hub have no responsibility for these costumes. They will be taken as seen and are donated and taken at the parents/carers consent. We also cannot guarantee that everyone will find a suitable costume to swap.
Drop off Points
We all have costumes that are too small or have grown bored of, so please pass them on. We are looking for outfits and accessories that are clean and good condition. Take them to the following pop up drop off places in and around Acton and Ealing until Thursday 27th March 2025. They will be part of Costume swap in Acton on Saturday 1st March.
Drop off points for Fancy Dress Costumes are:
- ActOne Cinema and Cafe, The Old Library, 119-121 High St, Acton, London W3 6NA
- Northfields Community Library: 255A Northfield Ave, London W5 4UA
- West Ealing Library, Melbourne Avenue, West Ealing, London W13 9BT
- Ealing Repair café will take donations at their sessions around the borough. See their Whats on for the dates.
Ealing Repair café will take Fancy Dress costumes and accessories at their sessions around the borough. See their what’s on page https://ealingrepaircafe.org/whats-on.
Run your own costume swap
A costume swap event can be an excellent way to make your World Book Day a more cost friendly and environmentally friendly celebration. If you cant make it to Acton’s Reduce and Recycle hub, see North London Waste Authority article for running your own costume swap . To get you started, they have put together a helpful resource pack on setting up your own swap shop. There is also a poster for advertising your event.
More Inspiration for World Book day
Here are more ideas on how to have a sustainable World Book day:
- Reuse: If you’ve already got a costume from previous parties or World Book Days, bring it out and use it again. Chances are your kids can’t even remember what they went as last time, let alone any of their friends. Here are Hubbubs quick and easy ideas for world book day costumes ideas.
- Borrow: Ask around friends and family if they have a costume you can borrow. Use school discussion pages such as Facebook or whats app to see if there is interest to give away costumes. It could be a place where everyone shared what outfits they had, and/or what they were looking for. There will be a lot of families with costumes that no longer fit and need a new home.
- Upcycle: Have a quick scout around the charity shops and see what you can find. Our local charity shops have lots of great clothes and costumers. Plus with a little creativity you honestly don’t need to be an expert at sewing either. It only takes very basic hand sewing, or failing that getting happy with a glue gun.
- Buy smart: Loads of characters have pretty easy costumes that you can make from things you already have. Or buy clothing that the children will wear again. Mary’s son dressed up as Joker from Batman. She bought a purple cotton shirt and green trousers, both of which have become staple clothing in his wardrobe. She could have bought a Joker “fancy dress “ costume. This is likely to be made from polyester and cheap materials which do not survive as long as day to day clothing.
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