People of all ages in colorful costumes filled Main-Dempster Mile on Saturday as they trick-or-treated at local businesses during the business district’s annual Spooky Saturday celebration.
Among the crowd were Laura Wells, Elizabeth Hitt, Ann Harriman and Margarete Mandry, four friends from the Evanston and Chicago areas.
For the group of friends, Spooky Saturday has become a yearly tradition — this year marked their fifth time attending together.
The annual event contained many festivities, including trick-or-treating, pumpkin carving and costume contests, each drawing large crowds.
“I think what we’ve seen is the entire community coming out, loving one another and sharing,” Wells said.
Although Wells didn’t dress up, Harriman dressed up as a witch.
Some of her favorite parts of the event included seeing everyone’s costumes and discovering new shops while wandering along the street, Harriman said.
“Everybody’s filled with goodwill,” Mandry said. “Everybody’s in a good mood. And everybody is having a ball.”
Gabi Cooney, the events and marketing manager for Evanston Pour, said Spooky Saturday is an opportunity to “connect with people who might not have known that we existed here.”
For Stumble & Relish owner Jaime Leonardi, Spooky Saturday is one of the happiest days of the year.
“We always love it,” Leonardi said. “We get so many cute costumes, and it’s super fun for us too, just to give all the kids candy.”
In addition to trick-or-treating, Spooky Saturday features many headline events, one of which is the pet costume contest.
Hershey, a dog who dressed up as Doc from Back to the Future, won this year. It was his second time participating with his parents, Carolina Hernandez and Gabriel Donatelli.
For Hernandez and Donatelli, events such as the pet costume contest are valuable staples of the Evanston community.
“My favorite part is just seeing everybody’s creativity,” Hernandez said. “I think there’s a new costume every year. The biggest difference from last year is that people are more creative, building more floats and being more extravagant.”
Hernandez spent a week building Hershey’s outfit and a DeLorean time machine to wheel him around. After the contest, people gathered to take photos and selfies with the champion dog.
Hernandez said pets offer a unique opportunity to connect with people across Evanston.
“I feel like everybody gets behind cute pets, so it’s always a good opportunity to come together,” Hernandez said. “We also met so many people because everybody wants to take pictures, so we got to interact with so many different people.”
Correction: A previous version of this story’s photo gallery incorrectly stated the winner of the pumpkin contest. The Daily regrets this error.
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