Midwestern Conventions?

So much of what is Steampunk, Victoriana, or Maker-Related (as far as I can see) seems to happen in Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, NYC, and Atlanta.

There are many events happening on or near the coasts, I don't tend to see nearly as much in the middle, save for what DJ Infamous and crew manage in the Oklahoma through Missouri and Kansas area - and maybe I am just not looking in the right places.

I'd love to find some events in the Northern Ohio, Michigan, Eastern Illinois, Northern Indiana areas, but anything within less than 6 hours driving distance would be fantastic.

So, I am putting this thread up in hopes that people will share information Conventions happening in the Midwest. I know I could use the information, hopefully others can benefit as well.

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Permalink Reply by Wendy Zdrodowski on October 21, 2009 at 9:17am

Me too

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Permalink Reply by Dr.Captain Adriana Farrier on September 10, 2009 at 12:59pm

Just as a note:

I've posted a new event for MidOhioCon. It's a comic book/pop culture convention but they welcome costuming of all varieties and it's an amazing place to just hang out and meet cool people. I know we had a couple of steampunks last year and I'm hoping we can up the attendance a bit. A 2-day weekend pass is $25 and a day pass is $15. There's an event posted here on the Empire for anyone who is interested.

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Permalink Reply by Kylara Kenshea on October 21, 2009 at 11:55am

Opus Fantasy Festival is on the verge of becoming a Steampunk-oriented convention: http://www.opusfest.com/index.html (hopefully returning in 2010)
There's also our local anime convention: http://ndkdenver.org/ (We had a turnout of something like 50 steampunkers)
And MileHiCon is occurring this weekend, with potential to be Steampunk overrun as well: http://www.milehicon.org/
And for the more sci-fi geeky steampunks, Starfest: http://www.starland.com/
These are all in Colorado, which is more MidWest than Ohio, last I checked. :)

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Permalink Reply by Myke Amend on October 21, 2009 at 5:59pm

Well - I am looking for more "midwest" according to when the term was coined, when the West included Kansas, Western Missouri, etc... Though Colorado would be a wonderful place to be.

If it were entirely up to me, I'd be looking towards the bigger cons out West most of the time - but travel, hotels, and shipping make most of them far too expensive. On a few hundred worth of shipping, I am lucky if I make half that much back in sales, before paying another couple hundred to have things shipped back, and having to figure out what to do with however many hundreds in broken/damaged/missing things have come of the process.

Driving it saves on shipping, but means thousands in gas and hotels just to get there and back.. let alone the stay. In an economy where hardly anyone is buying anything they don't absolutely need - these ventures can be a few thousand in pure loss outside of people met and fun had - which would always be well-worth it 2 years ago... not so much now.

Ones that I can drive to are wonderful to find, but very rare when it comes to Steampunk conventions... or so I thought. There have been some really interesting events posted here - I hope I can take part in even half of them this year.

I would love to look into those Colorado ones as well though. Thank you.

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Permalink Reply by Coal City Steam on October 21, 2009 at 12:33pm

Click on the Events Tab at CoalCitySteam.com - I keep a list of major events and highlight a meet-up of the week there. MANY cons will be having Steam Stuff in the midwest. Is Chattanooga TN too far for you?

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Permalink Reply by Myke Amend on October 21, 2009 at 6:00pm

A 12 hour drive - with an anticipated overnight stay in my home town of Cincinnati to break up the trip. Not too far... perhaps even convenient ^_^

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Permalink Reply by Chloe Brennan on October 21, 2009 at 5:19pm

Will anyone be attending Youmacon next weekend? [October 29th - November 1st] I'll be there and I was hoping to maybe set up some kind of meet!

I've heard that the World Steam Expo will have some kind of advertisement booth set up at Youmacon!

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Permalink Reply by Arthur M. Geissler on November 16, 2009 at 10:58am

I hope that you had a good time at Youmacon, were you able to make it to the room party Saturday evening?

The proper site is now up and functional at this time. http://www.worldsteamexpo.com The first batch of guests have been announced, hotel reservation is now available, and much much more to come. For those interested, Abney Park will be performing at the expo.

Information for vendors and artists shall be announced soon, and registration is right around the corner.

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Permalink Reply by Chloe Brennan on November 16, 2009 at 11:24am

I had an AMAZING time at Youma! Thanks for holding another great one<3 I didn't make the WSX room party though :[ Here are the pictures from our off the schedule Friday night meet-up: The Chronos Society's Pictures (You'll probably have to have a facebook account and be logged in to see them)

I'm so excited about the website though! I booked my room over the phone 2 days after Youma ended! I am ridiculously excited for WSX and its still so far away....

Will there be any goings-on at Ohayocon for it?

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Permalink Reply by Phineus Sturgeon on October 27, 2009 at 4:25pm

Has anyone mentioned Steamposium on this thread, yet? Steamposium will be in April of 2010 in St. Louis.

The web page is getting more and more information up all the time. The three big things that I'm looking forward to are these:

1. Salon-style convention in a very nice, steam-punky hotel. The lady organizing this works some big-name conventions, like Gen-Con and Dragon-Con, worked with the Camarilla for many years, hosts a smaller, relax-a-con style convention in St. Louis. It's going to be knock-out!

2. Actual symposium - Papers presented, top presenters are elected to 'Fellow of the R.O.S.E.' and will be on panels judging papers at later symposiums.

3. Bazaar - In addition to the standard dealer/vendor room, there will be a bazaar set up one day where ordinary folk can sell small amounts of goods. Or, if you are a vendor/dealer type but don't have a lot of merchandise (my usual state of affairs). You can forgo dealer fees... The Bazaar does not charge a set fee, but asks for a 10% commission of sales that will go towards the R.O.S.E. Society's charity.