ADVERTISEMENT What? Summerween. It’s Halloween – the spooky decor, candy eating and horror movie watching – but in summer!
Why? Because Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total…
No Mean Girls quotes, please. Sorry, what we meant to say is, we have no definitive answers to that question. But it’s likely because people are drawn to the cosy ambience, campy costumes, and gothic aesthetics of Halloween. Younger generations in particular are big fans of the holiday, with 54 per cent of 18-24 year old Brits viewing it positively, according to a YouGov survey.
It’s also worth mentioning that not everyone loves summer, instead seeking out the comforts traditionally associated with autumn. A study by Denmark’s Recreational Fear Lab (yes, that’s a thing) even found that watching horror movies can help ease anxiety – so maybe Summerween is a promising way to keep any summertime sadness at bay?
Why summer? We know what you’re thinking – the vibes are all wrong. This is a time for beaches and BBQs, not jack-o’-lanterns and jump scares! But the idea of Summerween actually originated over a decade ago, in the 2012 Disney TV series Gravity Falls. It’s explained that the fictional locals loved Halloween so much, they decided to celebrate it twice a year – on 22 June.
While there’s still no real-world official date, many people online have decided to implement their own spooky celebrations throughout the summer, with over 180k uses of the hashtag #summerween on TikTok.
Is it popular everywhere? The majority of Summerween videos on social media are from content creators based in the United States and United Kingdom, with the latter spending approximately £776 million (€892m) on spooky festivities last year, according to research by Finder.com. This makes sense, with Halloween very much an Anglo-American holiday – although its influence is still spreading. In Germany, 61 per cent of respondents to a 2024 survey agreed that Halloween has become more popular in their country.
How would one (hypothetically) go about celebrating Summerween? Swap pumpkins for Jack-o-melons, mummify your hotdogs with pastry ‘bandages’, or drink cocktails from mugs that look like skulls! The main idea is to give everything summery a spooky-twist. Decorations also tend to take on a pastel-hued playfulness, with baby pink cobweb cushions, sparkly ghoulish throws, and candles moulded into skeletons on pool floats. Much of this aesthetic has been propagated by European retail chain TK Maxx – known for its distinctly weird homeware offerings.
If Halloween blends into summer, what’s next? Christmas in October?! We see what you’re saying – and your fears are not entirely unfounded (TK Maxx sometimes stock their Christmas decorations from August). Commercial holidays like Halloween are, of course, driven by consumerism, which companies are capitalising on earlier and earlier each year, realising there’s a market that’s hungry for all things goth and girly. This comes at the cost of anything feeling truly seasonal and special; time an amorphous swell of existential chaos and ornamental witches wearing sunglasses.
But while it might make your yearnings for order and ritual twitch, holidays also tend to inspire a child-like sense of joy, whimsy and creativity that can help enliven the long, reflective months of summer.
To be fair, the heat already has us sweaty and sleepless… Exactly, might as well put Slumber Party Massacre on and scream for ice cream. Happy Summerween!
