Fortnum & Mason - Piccadilly since 1707

All Hail to Hallowe’en: Frightday the 28th October saw 54 children and 102 adults compete for fabulous prizes in the Fortnum & Mason annual Pumpkin Carving Competition.

The adult winner was 22 year-old design student Coco Canessa from Streatham. She was thrilled to win the top prize of £1000 hamper.

“It was my first attempt at pumpkin carving so i was really thrilled and totally shocked to have won, especially considering the standard of so many other entries, some were really incredible! I do a bit of illustration in my spare time and based the design on a few old drawings”

Coco’s winning design was displayed with the runners up in the famous Fortnum’s windows, for all to marvel at their extraordinary carving skills.

Please see above the winning pumpkin and examples of some of the amazing carved pumpkins that were entered into the Fortnum & Mason Pumpkin Carving Competition.

Fortnum & Mason trading director, Simon Burdess spoke for all the team at the store:

"At Fortnum & Mason we have always had a history of the artistic and the aesthetic in our shop windows as well as in-store and wanted to get our customers involved with our Halloween celebrations with the annual pumpkin carving competition. We were amazed at how many people wanted to be involved this year and the level of artistic creativity out there. We have lots of events taking place in the store throughout the year and this one has really shown us that our customers are keen to celebrate these types of occasion, particularly seen through our Halloween sales surpassing those of Valentine's Day".

So, put the date in your diary for next year, and start honing your Hallowe’en creativity. The competition is bound to be horribly close!