RICHMOND, Va. — A project that started with a $5 Halloween costume and a sandwich shop has grown to an Instagram account garnering attention across Richmond and gaining hundreds of followers per week. The Instagram handle @mostlyghostingyou tells the story of a friendly ghost who wanders around Richmond visiting restaurants and popular hot spots, but how exactly did this ghost float into Richmond? CBS 6 spoke with the account’s creators to learn the ghost’s origin story and find out what’s next for the city’s newest – and deadest – internet star.
How did this account come into existence, whose idea was it?
So two years ago I was a ghost for Halloween and I just loved the costume. I work at Garnett’s and one day suggested that we post a picture of me in the costume on the Garnett’s Instagram account and it blew up and got more likes than anything else on the page. After that, I realized it was something that people were into and I loved the idea, and so I asked a friend to do a photo shoot, and the account was born.”
Happy Halloween y’all! Have a spooky day. 👻👻
But that was back in February right? and then there was a gap in posting between then and last week – why?
“Things kind of fell through with the original photographer but I just couldn’t stop thinking about the idea and I knew it was something I wanted to pursue – to have a whole page dedicated to the ghost. I found Meagan’s Instagram (photographer @meagangoesclick) through a coworker and she was into the idea as well.”
So how do you pick your locations?
“I actually have a whole list of ideas saved on the notes app on my phone. Meagan and I have only gone out and shot twice so far but we’ll typically just start at one location and then see something cool across the street and be like “let’s go over there,” a lot of it is just having random ideas as we go along.”
Have you managed to spook anyone with your costume?
“We were shooting on Broad St. the other day and I heard someone almost rear end a car because they were staring at us… but other than that I don’t think we’ve scared anyone. I’m definitely not trying to scare anyone either – but we definitely get some weird looks.”
Does the ghost have a required thread count for the sheets used?
“The sheet we use is the same sheet as my original Halloween costume which was bought for under $5 from a thrift store – it’s really just a regular old sheet.”
Are you worried at all about getting in legal trouble? In Virginia, it’s illegal to be fully masked in public.
“I actually didn’t realize that… but we always take it off and ask for permission before shooting anywhere and everyone so far has been cool with it”
How long do you plan on keeping the project going?
“We plan to keep going until we run out of ideas. Meagan said we should continue until we run out of puns but honestly I don’t know if we ever will.”
What have reactions been like on Instagram and in person?
“People really love it, we get messages on Instagram all the time from viewers saying how much they love it. – someone even sent us some fan-art the other day. In public can be different, a bus driver actually stopped and yelled at us that we were crazy but we were standing in the middle of the road so… but other than that there haven’t been any negative reactions.”
How does the ghost eat?
“The ghost’s favorite food is ice-scream – that’s actually going to be our next project.”
Given that Richmond is such a historic (and probably haunted) city — have you ever run into any other ghosts?
Just the ghosts of exes past. I’m mostly kidding, but no I haven’t run into any yet. We tried to connect with the Byrd Theater ghost. I’ve heard of a couple other haunted places that we definitely plan to visit.
