We’re so excited to be running the Cosplay Masquerades at MegaCon Live Birmingham in just a few short weeks’! Now our entrants have submitted their applications, it’s time to announce our judges for the weekend. We’ll be introducing one judge a day and you can meet all of them right here.
Announcing our final judge for the Saturday Cosplay Masquerade: Kizuki Cosplay.
Do you remember when you first discovered cosplay? For Kizuki, also known as Kisa, it was when her mother took her to a tiny anime convention over a decade ago. “I watched the masquerade, and I was speechless!”, she remembers. “Three months later, I had already made my first costume – Dark Magician from YuGiOh! – which, looking back, was super ambitious. I would barely know how to make it now, let alone then! But back then there was no social media or anyone else to impress except for our teenage selves, so I didn’t care and got stuck in! It’s been ten years since that day, and I’ve learned so much – both creative skills and about life!”
Patterning and sewing have quickly become Kisa’s favourite parts of the construction process. “I still have the most to learn with patterning, but it’s so satisfying to sew something really neat. I would love to try more hand-sewing and embroidery; there’s a danger of cosplay becoming too close to ‘fast fashion’, so I want to slow down the process and enjoy the smaller details.”
It’s not just fashion that’s fast – Kisa’s sewing has been too, and she’s no stranger to con-crunch: “When I first started cosplay, I made lots of costumes in a rush, and now they’re unsellable or can’t be upgraded because of hot-glued fabric! Now, when I don’t have time to finish a costume before an event, I never make irreversible choices, so I can always go back and improve, and create less waste from throwing out old costumes.”
Kisa has worked on costumes and props for films and TV shows, but Angrboda, made in collaboration with Santa Monica Studios to promote God of War: Ragnarok, is the most challenging cosplay she’s ever made. “The number of different skills I had to learn was insane: loads of leatherworking, and especially laser cutting different materials. You can never research and experiment too much now that there are more methods and materials accessible to hobbyist cosplayers than ever before. However, I learned the hard way that I should definitely research and test more before jumping in at the deep end with things like laser cutting Worbla. Let’s just say it smells bad, for a very long time…”
The interconnectedness of the cosplay community is what fires Kisa up to make more costumes, and work with more people. “For me, the enjoyment of cosplay comes from how social and collaborative it is. I almost exclusively cosplay in groups; it’s really fun to help each other during the making process, and ridiculously fulfilling when everyone comes together with their finished costumes. I want to continue travelling and meeting cosplayers from all over the world!”
