MORE ABOUT MY CONTEST DIRECTORIES

I have been following the cosplay Crown Championships since it's inception. It's a really cool contest, now contest series, that has evolved into a huge international spectacle and it's incredibly inspiring to me as a creator. I have always loved finding new artists to follow take inspiration from from these contests so 2022 after losing all information and access to event recordings and records from that year, I was extremely disappointed and started keeping my own records so I could refer back to them (just in my notes app — nothing fancy).

In 2023 I had a conversation with a mutual of mine, Fancy Duckie, who expressed interest in keeping records of Anime Boston for similar reasons and it really changed my understanding of the cosplay community. Despite being a part of the commynity for over ten years at that point, even amongst cosplayers I had thought I that I was the odd one out for seeking information like this, but in reality there were a lot of people looking for information on competitions and our community history. So I set out to put my Crown research into an accessible format and to work with Duckie to create the Anime Boston Directory. The Unofficial Anime Boston Masquerades Directory was released publicly and partially complete in April 2024 (it is still a work in progress), and the Unofficial Crown Championships Directory was released publicly and largely completed (and now fully up to date) in December 2024.

These directories, while really difficult to find information for and fill out, have been really interesting to work on. It's been really cool to look back and see how cosplay and contests have evolved over the years. While I've been following these contests for so long (the Crown since the beginning!) it's easy to forget all the changes that have be made to them and the trends that have come and gone within the cosplay community. The directories were made with the intention to credit creators so anyone could find and enjoy their work, but they have become a unique resource showing cosplay history in a way I haven't seen anywhere else. I am really proud to have worked on these and I hope they can be used and enjoyed by many, however, I would absolutely love to see events themselves take initiative and create official resources like these to actively document and support the incredible subculture of cosplay!