23/01/24
We’re nailing down the speakers so a timetable of talks can be drawn up, and finalising the arrangements for the awards.
Think of awards, remember to make your UK Larp Awards nominations, if you haven’t already.
Every year there are more of you, telling us the fantastic things they’ve seen and done at events, and the amazing people they met there. We have seen the whole look and feel of events being raised and, more significantly, accessibility has been a greater focus for people both running and attending games.
11/01/24
This year is going to be HUGE!
We had to redesign the whole market layout just to fit everything in, and there are still new applicaions arriving reasonably regularly.
We have many old favourites, back again, and a scattering of new faces; keen to show you all their inovative products.
Pop over to the traders/artists/promoters listing pages to find links and check them out.
We’re lining up talks, demonstratons and panels to interest, inspire and inform and the Bring and Buy will be there again too.
We will be able to add the celebration of 50yrs of Dungeons and Dragons, as well as 40yrs of Paranoia RPG too, which neatly links to our special guest – Larper, artist, and illustrator in several of the D&D sourcebooks – Anne Stokes will be there to meet, chat and sign things.
30/10/23
Frantic planning behind the scenes for the 3rd when setup for the LarpCon November kitfair begins!
We said a reluctant farewell to Helen as part of the planning commitee as her life moved in a different direction. We thank her for all her awesome work keeping things on the rails and will hopefully see her at more actual larps.
We made a promotional video which you can see here.
For the kitfair we have 2 basketball court’s worth of traders, raring to go, and the bring & buy will be waiting for you to visit with a bag of -really cool signature piece from that one particular character- kit to sell. Profit for you and profit for charity!
It is also a great place to grab a gift for that special nerd in your life.
10/03/23
With LarpCon 2023 behind us, we can relax for a bit and check out all the photos and comments from the weekend.
The tidying, cleaning and returning to storage for the red hi-vis, vinyl banners and Bring & Buy signs.
Some things will hang around a little longer as we try to unite awards with their winners, and the lost propety will languish in a baggie, hoping to be collected by a greatful owner.
Plans for 2024 are already being laid, plus a kit fair intended for November 2023 is also in the works.
The theme will be connected to the release of Paranoia rpg in 1984.
Friend computer suggests you watch this space*
*probably not actually this space. Most likely it’ll be all over Facebook before it seeps through to here…
08/01/23
Planning is in full swing.
Traders, promoters, artists and guests are filling our inbox with requests and bookings. Spaces are filling fast, despite the bigger space available.
This year we calebrate 40 years since the publication of Sir Terry Pratchett’s first Diskworld novel – The Colour of Magic.
At the request of his estate (in return for permission to use his words as inspiration) we are supporting the Orangutan Foundation as our charity.
There will also be talks and demonstrations to distract you from your shopping and socialising.
Tickets will be on sale soon.
13/01/2022
The threat of plague is lessening, the building work is almost complete, all signs point to LarpCon going ahead as scheduled in a brand new facility!
We’ve been able to poke around inside a little bit already, and the ideas are flowing (we really won’t be able to loose arrows at anyone climbing the walls though, *sad face*).
The biggest news must be the special guest – Sir – Ian Livingstone!
The co-creator of a unique genre of literature, co-founder of Games workshop (he had a hand in creating Lara Croft too!), will be attending, signing things, talking about games and game design then probably getting roped into the silliness that is the Larp Awards on Saturday night too.
The market hall is booking up rapidly, tickets will be ready to go on sale very soon as well…
All systems GO!!!
14/01/2021
Well… Who expected this???
20/2/2020
The shortlists are up, the judges are pondering, there are medals and trophies waiting to go to the theatre. Everything is falling into place for an exciting weekend.
24/1/2020
Talsorian Games are sending us some Cyber-Punk prizes and RP games to run!
Sadly, we weren’t able to get facetime with Mike Pondsmith for LarpCon. Apparently, he’s a busy guy right now. Who would have guessed…
Almost all of the traders are booked, quite a few promoters already confirmed and we have a full programme of talks, panels and discussions.
We will have some champion machines, from “Robot Wars”, to meet and an arena for everyone to try their hand at controlling battle-bots.
The Larp Awards nominations are in progress, with a lively response already You can nominate too, by following this Link
The photography competition has been launched.
Take a look, or enter them by following these links to the Photography Categories or the Advanced Photography Categories
Friday night is quiz night, and the poker tournament will be taking place that night, as usual, too.
The Starship Bridge Simulator will be there for the weekend and slots can be booked by following this Link…, along with tickets to the convention by clicking on the tab to the right of the starship bridge (or this Link).
Our chosen charity for this year is The National Autistic Society
As part of this, we will be opening at 10am on Sunday (instead of 11am) for a calm and tranquil “Autism Hour” – before tannoy announcements, shouting and crowds pick up.
We ask visitors, traders, crew and promoters to respect this in order for people to be able to access Larp in a more tolerable level of stimulation.
Larp Awards tickets are not yet available – It’s okay, they haven’t sold out already, they will be on sale very soon.
3/9/2019
After a very hot, dusty and busy summer, we’re back on it.
Look out for announcements and updates as we confirm the traders, promoters and guests attending.
5/4/2019
Much quicker than last year – here are the feedback survey results. Many thanks to everyone who responded!
The majority of people seemed to feel that we had the right balance of promoters, talks, panels and workshops, puppets, battle of the nations, mini-larps and special guests.
People still want more traders – we’re not sure where we can fit more in, but we’ll see what we can do!
If you would like to give/run a talk, workshop or be part of a panel then please get in touch with what you’d like to do. If you have ideas for what you’d like to see then similarly, please let us know.
What we’re also going to look to do, is to improve the diversity of traders’ products,
Someone requested more activities for children – if you have any ideas for entertainment for children (not a creche, as it was used by almost no-one) then please let us know!
We’ve raised a few issues with the venue, who apologised and are aiming to improve facilities (particularly the toilets).
We are limited by the size of the venue, however a new bigger venue is being built for us, and should be ready for LarpCon 2022.
We’re contemplating different ways of making announcements during the event – including a text messaging service.
Next year we’ll look to providing poster-sized timetables, and better distribution of the event programme.
This year we tried running the costume competition in a different way – judges as opposed to attendee votes. If we were to hold the costume competition next year then we would need to review the criteria and the way it runs.
Time to turn our focus solely on planning for LarpCon 2020!
27/3/2019
Now everything is counted up and balanced , we’ll be sending a glorious £1007 to the charity – Mind (N.B. this sum does not include the generous £120 contribution made by Matthew Guthrie from the auction of the Legacy tickets which he won in the combat tournament)
Thank you and well done to everyone who helped and contributed.
We’re already in negotiations with a special guest for next year – watch this space…
6/3/2019
What a great weekend!
People travelled from far and wide to play, shop, laugh and take part in the talks, discussions, Larps, displays and tasters which were squeezed into LarpCon, not to mention all the people who enjoyed the Pasty Pirate Puppet Show!
Not everything was perfect and any feedback, about how we can make next year even better, is welcomed. We’re now wrapping up the loose ends for ’19, and we already started making plans for 2020!
27/02/2019
The final pieces are coming together.
Tomorrow the preliminary jobs, like marking out the marketplace, and putting up the glossy photographs of the shortlisted pictures (which arrived today) can be done.
The judges votes are almost all submitted and we’ll be working out the winners very soon.
LarpCon and the Larp Awards are almost here!
19/02/2019
Phew! That’s all the nominations filtered down to the shortlists, ready to be revealed and shown to the judges.
So much love, for so many wonderful people, well over 100 clubs and games, and around 100 more talented people who feed, clothe and arm us all.
Keep doing whatever it is you’re doing, because it moves people, and the Larp Awards are about celebrating those efforts.
09/02/19
The promoters space is filling rapidly and the action in the photographic awards categories is heating up. Posters and fliers are appearing everywhere we go, with the Larpspotting ad on one side and the revamped, easier to read, anti-harassment policy on the other (its better to have one and not need it, than need one and not have it).
The floor plan for the traders is poised to be posted here, before being added to the event programme ready to help attendees on the day.
25/01/19
All the traders are confirmed and booking for the marketplace is now closed.
Although plenty of promoters are confirmed already, there is still space available.
Also attending are: Artists – Giles Meakin and Steff Morris, and actors – Phil Rose aka Friar Tuck (Robin of Sherwood) and James McKenzie aka Raven (Raven).
The “Advanced” category has just been launched in the photography competition. Take a look, or enter, Here
Friday night is quiz night, and the poker tournament will be taking place that night, as usual, too.
The Starship Bridge Simulator will be there for the weekend and slots can be booked, along with tickets to the convention and awards ceremony, by following this Link…
We have a “Legendary” archery competition, with prizes from Archery Legends, and Legacy Lrp is holding the combat tournament. The archery tournament will be taking place on both Saturday and Sunday, the combat only on Saturday.
Ticket sales are now active!
18/01/19
The trade hall is filling up, VIPs are booked, talks and activities are taking shape. The tickets will be available imminently.
Nominations for the awards are flooding in and its shaping up to be a great event.
6/11/18
The hectic summer period is now over, and we’ve had a nice sit down… 😀
Which has given us the chance to review the responses from the feedback survey. Many thanks to everyone who responded!
Survey results, by category, were:
Traders – 77.8% want more traders (note: no respondent wanted less traders!) We’re looking at ways to increase the selection of traders and products offered for 2019.
Promoters – 92.5% want at least the same or more promoters. Unfortunately there is no more space to fit promoters in. For 2019, we will be encouraging promoters who run multiple games to combine them onto one pitch, which allows us to fit in additional systems.
Talks, panels and workshops – 92.6% want at least the same or more more talks, panels and workshops. We intend to have a full program of these again next year. If you would like to give/run a talk, workshop or be part of a panel then please get in touch with what you’d like to do. If you have ideas for what you’d like to see then similarly, please let us know.
Battle of the Nations – 83.3% want at least the same or more Battle of the Nations. The battling knights will return again in 2019.
Mini Larps – 85.1% want at least the same or more mini larps. We have some ideas of larps to run, if you’d like to run a Larp next year, get in touch with more information about your larp.
Special Guests – 88.9% want at least the same or more. We will have the same amount or more special guests next year
Wrestling – 76.9% want less wrestling. (It possibly should be noted that this was still less people than actually *watched* the wrestling!) The wrestling is noisy, it goes on for a long time and takes up a bunch of room. Whilst we enjoy the wrestling, we’ve run it for 3 years and feel like we could do with a change in entertainment anyway. We’re changing the layout of the room slightly and using the freed up space to fit in some more traders.
We’ll still be having entertainment (and the raised seating area) but are conscious that any entertainment *will* be noisy and can be a distraction, so we’ll stick closer to the planned timetable, meaning attendees can plan their shopping accordingly. We’re also investigating the use of ceiling banners to deaden the noise.
Additional feedback included:
There was an issue where traders or promoters were unable to attend or left early – this information wasn’t communicated effectively enough with attendees, not helped by the event floor plan and timetable handout not being delivered on time due to the snow.
We are looking at ways of addressing this issue in future (probably with a massive information board in the entrance), as well as better signage to help people navigate the building (mainly large signs saying “toilets” as “changing rooms” really isn’t clear enough).
And finally, “More promotion of the event is needed…” (From someone not wanting to be added to our mailing list! 🙂 )
This is something that you can all help with. We run a Facebook ad campaign and share our event far and wide, we also distribute posters and in the region of 10,000 flyers (not forgetting the promo video, with Hugo Myatt that had over 5000 views 😉 ).
We’d like as many people as possible to hear about LarpCon, it’s a great place to find out about Larp for new players (and an amazing place to come to if you’re already a larper!), so please invite your friends to the event and share the link with everyone and everywhere that will find it of interest!