Kumoricon will have a booth at the Festival Japan 2008 at the Beaverton Uwajimaya—our first outreach event after Kumoricon 2008.

“The Japan-America Society of Oregon, Uwajimaya, and NW Natural will be presenting the eighth annual Festival Japan on Saturday and Sunday, September 27-28, 2008 (11:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.) at Uwajimaya Plaza in Beaverton, Oregon. This exciting community event has been organized to bring about awareness and appreciation of the Japanese culture. It showcases a wide variety of performances, exhibitions, cultural demonstrations and Japanese children's games, everything from taiko drumming and ikebana to martial arts and cooking demonstrations. Festival Japan is focused and designed for family entertainment.”

We will be selling pre-registrations to Kumoricon 2009.

Any volunteers who would like to help staff the booth, answer questions, and take registrations, please email publicity@kumoricon.org.

Thanks to our attendees for making this the largest Kumoricon yet!

A huge thanks to those people, staff, volunteers, and guests, who built an environment for fun that exceeded everyone’s expectations!

The biggest thank you goes to every person who was at Kumoricon this year for having a part in making this the most fantastically fun weekend in Kumoricon history!

Our paid attendance was 4470, nearly 50% larger than last year.

We also raised $4550 in the charity auction for p:EAR—double the amount we raised last year!

This year saw an amazing amount of entries into the mascot contest. The staff cast their votes to determine the winner and we are pleased to announce our new mascot for 2009:

Chevelle Abad – Be sure and thank her for an awesome job!

We are also excited to announce our new hotel for Kumoricon 2009 and 2010:

The Hilton Portland and Executive Tower

This venue, located in the heart of downtown, with plenty of food options and easy MAX access, will allow us to grow main events by roughly 50% and have a better stage arrangement using the Grand Ballroom. We will also have several more options that haven’t been possible in the past due to space constraints in previous hotels.

The dates of Kumoricon 2009 and 2010 are:

September 5-7, 2009 – Labor Day Weekend
September 4-6, 2010 – Labor Day Weekend

We are looking forward to continuing to provide opportunities for cosplay and anime fans to get together and have fun over the coming year. Keep an eye on the website for outreach events that will be happening during the year. We will be working with many college campus clubs to help sponsor events on campus.

Watch for announcements on 2009 guests and we look forward to seeing you at the next Kumoricon!

Elections

The Kumoricon 2009 elections and October general meeting will be held at our new hotel:

Hilton Portland and Executive Tower
Pavilion Room

921 SW Sixth Avenue
Portland, OR 97204

Saturday, October 11, 2008
11:00am-6:00pm

Nominations opened for Kumoricon 2009 officers at the Rant and Rave at the con, and remain open in the forums. As the date gets closer, more details will be posted including question and answer threads for the candidates and details on the agenda for the elections meeting.