- Year after year, designers report spending sleepless nights completing their complicated costumes in the days before the Carnival.
- Materials that have been used through the years in costumes and floats include:
fabrics of all kinds, feathers, ostrich plumes, faux zebra and leopard skins, wires, cardboard, brown paper dipped in starch, wire mesh, Styrofoam, plastic, foam rubber, gold and silver foil, sequins, gold and silver lamé, rhinestones, fiberglass, spandex, leatherette, silk, satin, chiffon, braid, Mylar, imitation skins, tinsel, aluminum rods and tubing, spray paint, beads and pearls. Floats may be made of aluminum tubing, heavy wire, fiberglass tape hose clamps, welded steel, papier- mâché, fabric and paint.
- "J'Ouvert" is a predawn celebration that marks the opening of Carnival, and Brooklyn's is the largest in the world.
- "Jump up" is energetic Carnival dancing.
- The first all-female steel band to compete in a Panorama competition anywhere in the world was Women in Steel, who first appeared in Brooklyn in 1998.
- A controversial rule bans plain T-shirts from the 2005 parade in favor of more decorative costumes. Opponents of the ban claim that it discriminates against people from islands with less of a costume tradition, such as Jamaica and Haiti.
- The West Indian-American Day Parade is the largest of its kind in North America.
- This year's theme is "Better Together in 2005."
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