Cosplay and Character Celebration

Every year somebody arrives having built Sera’s bound gauntlet out of leather offcuts and stubbornness, and every year it is better than anything the publisher has ever produced as merchandise. This afternoon exists to give that work a room of its own.

The shape of the day

One o’clock, doors and open workshop tables. Three o’clock, the maker’s panel: six costumers talking about materials, failures and the specific problem of making armor that a person can sit down in. Four thirty, the parade, across the hall’s actual stage with actual lighting. Five o’clock, judging and prizes.

Categories are craft, interpretation, and — the one everybody competes for — best solution to an impossible description. The author is on record as having written several garments that cannot physically exist, and watching people solve them anyway is the highlight of the year.

Why come

You do not have to be in costume. Half the room never is. The panel is worth the ticket on its own if you make anything with your hands, and the open tables at the start are a genuine repair-and-advice service: bring the thing that is not working and somebody will know why.

For readers, it is the friendliest room on the tour. Characters that have only ever existed as sentences walk past you carrying a cup of tea, and the effect is hard to describe and harder to forget.

How to take part

Entry is free. Register a costume for judging on the day at the desk before three o’clock — there is no advance entry and no requirement that anything be finished. Unfinished work is welcome in the parade and has won before.

Photography is fine; ask the person first, always.