Heidi Klum has snakes coming out of her head (don’t look)

Every year, Klum spends months trying to outshine the array of other costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has become something of a mainstay in New York City over the last quarter-century. In years past, she has dressed as a worm, a peacock, a werewolf, an ogress and E.T., the endearing alien from Steven Spielberg’s 1982 film. She has also dressed as a “clone” of herself and as an older version of herself.

As Klum posed before photographers, more than a dozen animatronic snakes seemed to slither from her head, and her eyes glowed with reptilian contact lenses. Her body was encased in a snake suit with a nearly 8-foot tail, which housed a battery pack for the writhing snakes and a set of wheels so she could wriggle around. Her costume made it difficult to sit down and was so large that she took up most of the blue carpet outside the Hard Rock Hotel in midtown Manhattan.

Mike Marino, a Hollywood prosthetics designer and Klum’s longtime Halloween collaborator, said her costume this year was inspired by the snakelike, stop-motion Medusa from the 1981 movie “Clash of the Titans,” designed by Ray Harryhausen, the celebrated animator and special-effects creator.

The model and TV personality Heidi Klum, in costume as Medusa for her annual Halloween party, at the Hard Rock Hotel in New York on Friday, Oct. 1, 2025. Every year, Klum spends months preparing to outshine the array of other costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has become something of a mainstay in New York City over the last quarter-century. (Nina Westervelt/The New York Times)

“Please have a look at these teeth,” Klum said the day before her party, highlighting razor-sharp acrylic teeth. “If I bite someone in the neck, I could actually go for blood.”

“She’ll kill someone with them,” added Marino, who recently won an Emmy Award for the prosthetic makeup on the HBO Max series “The Penguin.”

It took several dozen people to bring the entire costume together. A scaled mask and gloves covered her face, neck and hands so every inch of her skin was concealed; the tiny slivers that peeked through were painted green. A 5-inch, split, reptile tongue hung out of her mouth and was attached onto her real tongue with a “suction cup device,” Marino said. For it to work, Klum had to make her own tongue “as dry as possible,” she said.

The teeth and the tongue did make it cumbersome for Klum to consume much throughout the evening. “That’s why I do it all now,” Klum said, nibbling away at tagliatelle while Marino stuck on her Medusa ears with glue hours before she walked onto the red carpet.

And, Marino said, going to the bathroom would be “very difficult” too. (Klum wore an adult diaper under her suit.)

Though the German-born model and her elaborate costumes have become somewhat synonymous with Halloween, earlier this year she expanded her reach with a spin on Oktoberfest — her first “Heidi Fest” in Munich — and is now considering putting the Heidi touch on yet another holiday: carnival.

“We do the carnival big in Germany too,” she said. “People are usually like: ‘Really? Carnival in Germany?’ But in February, we have a big carnival. Let’s see.”

The model and TV personality Heidi Klum, in costume as Medusa for her annual Halloween party, with other guests including her husband, Tom Kaulitz, center, dressed as a warrior turned into stone, at the Hard Rock Hotel in New York on Friday, Oct. 1, 2025. Every year, Klum spends months preparing to outshine the array of other costumes she has worn to her annual Halloween bash, which has become something of a mainstay in New York City over the last quarter-century. (Nina Westervelt/The New York Times)

Klum’s team came up with the idea of her dressing as Medusa about four months ago, which in her world is extremely late, she said.

When she selected the costume, Klum said, she was not thinking specifically about Medusa’s place in mythology as a female figure who, in some accounts, was sexually assaulted, transformed into a monster and later beheaded. Classicist Mary Beard has called Medusa “one of the most potent ancient symbols” of male triumph over female power.

“I’ve been playing with the idea of Medusa for a while, and I thought, ‘Let’s do Medusa right,’” Klum said. “She’s just a really cool, scary, snake-woman.”

Klum has already figured out what she wants to be next year because sometimes, inspiration just hits “like this,” she said, snapping her fingers, without giving any hints.