Axe-cessit Halloween Showcase – Competition Recap

New Zealand

One of our first entries came from Aotea College in Wellington, New Zealand.

We love what they were able to do with the books, using their colour as an effective backdrop to make faces of Frankenstein and Ghosts really pop. What we liked even more was the number of hands poking out from the bookshelves ready to grab unsuspecting students browsing the library. What a great idea!

Also in Wellington, Wellington College sent us photos of how their Halloween display looked from previous years. Their use of mannequins is fantastic and we are sure that having one of them wear a uniform really brought the level of ‘spook’ closer to home for the secondary school boys.

This year Wellington College gave their mannequin a new look and had it watch over an awesome display, boasting a great range of Halloween-themed books.

Another one of our early entries came from Howick College, in Auckland, New Zealand.

We think the effort that went in to Howick’s library is great. From a zombie guarding the door, banners crossed over windows, cobwebs spread across the circulation desk and giant spiders on top – Howick College’s library also boasted an awesome Halloween book display decorated with witch hats, ghosts and pumpkins. Seriously cool!

United Kingdom

Now over to the UK where we had another handful of entries.

Up first we had Dixons Unity Library with a great Halloween-themed book display, lined with Accessit’s free downloadable Halloween resources and an awesome ghost and skeleton (presumably on an adventure from the science room) on either side.

Then we had John Fisher School and the Knights Templar School submit their entries on the same day – with both being as terrifyingly terrific as each other.

Even though John Fisher School told us that their students weren’t finding them scary enough, having a lucky dip of ‘spooky poems’ is an idea we here at Accessit love and are sure other schools will try something similar in the future! (We hope they don’t become too spooky for the students next year!)

The Knights Templar School also had a lot going for their students, with Halloween-themed Accessit Web Apps accessible to browse their school library catalogue. They too had Accessit’s downloadable resources lining their book shelves, including a nicely spread-out book display with strings of cobwebs.

The final entry we had from the UK was that of Dereham Neatherd School – and this one blew us away.

So much so, that they are the winners of Axe-cessit’s Halloween Showcase! The spook in their library is the very definition of epic, and we hope the 2 hours of free Accessit training will support Lorraine in creating even more epic displays moving forward, particularly on the Accessit Web App.

Although only a couple of hours went in to it, the whole library seemingly transformed entirely for Halloween, with so many parts being decorated for Halloween.

Firstly, we love the pumpkin head lanterns hanging from the ceiling. They almost look like they are floating! School librarian, Lorraine, considers this everyone’s favourite feature, and says, “I am lucky that I have a high ceiling and a terrific site team who help hang these for me each year.”

The bookshelves are also fantastic, with really cool props and decorations adding levels of intrigue and character. One of the props used is another skeleton dressed in a Dracula’s cloak (possibly as a disguise so as not to taken back to the science room!).

Then, heading up the stairs, students would pass a darkened window covered in cobwebs to find a large spider at the top with its legs spread across the stairs (represented by black tinsel). Of course, students can only get to the spider once passing under the Death Eater from Harry Potter, drooping down from the ceiling.

And lastly, Dereham Neatherd School library had a room fully decorated and equipped to give the students a space to watch spooky movies during their lunch times – how great is that?

Lorraine gave us more of an insight on her Halloween displays, saying:

“Our students love seeing the library transformed with the seasons and Halloween displays are always popular. It creates an interest in books showcased as part of the display and the Terrifying Tales lunchtime read – completed with a bubbling cauldron.

The inspiration for the Halloween theme comes from the students loving the horror genre and Harry Potter (re-using many of my props from HP night). I tend to add items each year – the witch legs and using witch hats on books with faces on covers were added this year and many ideas are inspired by shared posts on social media from other librarians around the world.”

And it is this content shared by librarians around the world that Accessit loves too.

Overall, the time and effort that was put into decorating, transforming and “spookifying” these libraries has been wonderful to see. We love that these schools chose to share them with us and we at Accessit hope that the students really enjoyed engaging with it all.