Anime North Announcements

This is mostly a head’s up for people who are attending the convention, but there will likely be many images floating about later for those of you who can’t attend in person. Either way, please look forward to these events! I’ll be camping out in Gallery Momiji all weekend as that’s the department that I run. This will be our 10th year inside the Toronto Congress Centre and the 10th kimono display! You can find it in Hall D right beside the entrance to the Dealer’s Room. For those who want to see how kimono dressing is done, I’ll be publicly dressing the staff members for the Moonlight Ball on Friday starting at 6pm inside the Gallery. I may also be dressing my staff on Saturday morning and again on Sunday on the stage, so you can come check out some of the crazy kitsuke I manage to come up with on the fly. As for information, I’ll be holding my kimono panel twice this weekend! The first time will be Friday at 8pm and then again on Saturday at 2pm! Both will be taking place inside Gallery Momiji. The panel itself is called  “Kimono: History, Types, and Examples”; as can be guessed by that title, there will be many examples of kimono that you can come up and see for yourself, including some that are 200 years old! So, if you want to see some very old and very interesting kimono up close then this is a chance you don’t want to miss!

The kimono display will be running all weekend in Gallery Momiji and you can take pictures of the kimono this year! Previously we did not allow photography inside the Gallery space, but we’ve relaxed the rules surrounding the exhibits this year. The theme for the kimono display is “Colours of The Rainbow - A Celebration of Change,” with 13 kimono representing a huge stretch of colours and a surprise sub theme (I’ll keep that part a secret for now!). The other main exhibit is going to be GIANT, LIFE SIZED POKEMON SCULPTURES! I am super hyped for this and they are going to be so cool! Our “mini exhibit” that has focused of geimaiko for the past few years is also back! The theme this year is “Famous Flowers: The Legendary Geisha of Japan’s Most Prestigious District” which features an in depth look at some of Gion Kobu’s most famous geimaiko along with their personal uchiwa and images. There will also be maiko kanzashi displayed with each to bring out the flower theme. Finally, I will be doing a panel on shironuri with famous shironuri fashion icon Minori! This will be taking place on Saturday at 3:30pm in the Barton Room (the front panel rooms) of the Toronto Congress Centre. I’ll be starting off the panel by talking about the history of shironuri in Japan. After that we’ll be joined by another surprise guest who will be talking about the parallels of white makeup in Western theatre and such. From there Minori-san will be talking about contemporary shironuri use in Japanese street fashions. It’s going to be really cool (and probably packed) so you may want to arrive early if you want to be guaranteed a seat ^^