Halloween Sheffield: Spooky decorations at home in Woodhouse including giant spiders get ‘brilliant’ reactions

Dad-of-six John Berry spent around five days transforming his semi-detached home on New Cross Way, Woodhouse, in terrifying fashion for Halloween, and the effect is stunning. “Some of the reactions from kids to the spiders are hilarious,” said the 40-year-old, who works as a caretaker at Woodhouse Community Library. “There are a lot of people around who don’t like spiders. I think we’ve got around 12 big ones and lots of little ones.”

John is best known for his dazzling Christmas lights display, which draws people from far and wide, raising vital money for charity each year. He only started putting up Halloween decorations in a big way during the first year of lockdown to bring some much-needed joy to children in the area. But the Halloween display has grown each year and is now one of the best, if not the best, anywhere in Sheffield.

As well as the giant webs and spiders, there are brightly coloured skulls, skeletons and even a haunted village in his front garden, and he has made many of the decorations himself using old pallets and other materials. John did need a little help from his children to put them up, however, after shattering his ankle earlier this year. “Everyone loves it and we’ve had so many great comments,” said John, whose children are aged between 22 and one year old. “I like to do brighten up the area because people are pretty down with everything that’s going on at the moment. The cost of living crisis didn’t put me off doing this and it won’t stop me putting up the Christmas lights. I’ll just have to work a bit harder to pay for it.”

John put up this year’s Halloween display a couple of weeks before October 31 to give everyone a bit of time to enjoy them. But they will be coming down on November 1, as that’s when he and his family must begin the mammoth task of putting up the Christmas illuminations, which are so extensive they take a whole month to put in place ahead of the big December 1 switch-on.