A few weekends ago, my buddy Candace and I went to Hello Kitty Con 2014 in L.A.! This was the first ever Hello Kitty Con and also the first time ever Candace and I traveled together! She keeps weird hours, likes to knit until 6 am, and has a suitcase full of snacks. Um, PERFECT TRAVEL COMPANION FOR ME.
I arrived at the hotel first, took some video for Instagram, and then instructed Candace to not look on Insta, because I wanted her to be surprised when she walked in. We stayed at the LINE Hotel in Korea Town, which was the official hotel for the con. We kinda hemmed and hawed about staying there and actually had a cheaper, back-up reservation somewhere else, but we decided to GO FOR IT. (Photos are mostly mine, with some of Candace’s thrown in, and others noted when borrowed from someone else!)
I didn’t take photos of EVERYTHING, but you get the idea. We were able to take anything home that had Hello Kitty on it. I didn’t think about this at home and I didn’t bring a very big suitcase, so Candace ended up dealing with most of it cuz she stayed one more night than I did. Luckily, she travels with 8 million tote bags, so we were at least able to shove everything inside 8 million tote bags!
Here is one of Candace’s suitcases that looks like it’s 100% filled with flavored popcorn. There is a backstory behind this, but I’m not even going to get into it, cuz, it’s just awesome as it is.
Here’s the Hello Kitty donut I crocheted for myself that night in the hotel room. Both C and I were super tired and had only had like 1 hour of sleep the night before, but we were determined to DIY ourselves some accessories!!
On the day-of, I forgot to print out my ticket, so I visited the business room in our hotel and its super fancy color laser printer while C scoped out the shuttle we’d be taking to the con.
HELLO SHUTTLE!
After a short trip, we arrived! TBH, we got there really really late, like 2pm-late (it had opened at 10am). As it turned out, this was a great strategy because we didn’t have to wait in line to get our badges.
Before getting in the building, we stopped for some photos! On the left is me and Angie from Yumster Friends. I feel bad for not remembering the other person’s Instagram account name, but I know it had to do with Tokidoki!! On the right is me and Chrissa Sparkles who moderated the panels for the con. I saw that Yurie Sekiya x JapanLaClothing shirt on her AND HAD TO HAVE IT. Future outfit post!
There were two shopping areas. We got to see one and shop, but the other one was upstairs and had 40th anniversary exclusives, and we never got to see it because we didn’t have time to wait the alleged 4 hours in line! But we did get custom shirts at this booth!
While having a shop, I met this cutie Meagan!
I wanted to take photos by this Loungefly wall, but then I saw my friend Janice and started flapping my wings! Dat’s ok. I was posing next to a garbage can anyway.
Here’s Candace inside a giant coin purse. She loved this coin purse so much, that she took more pictures with it the next day.
At about this time, I saw a group of people walk by, because Katy Perry was coming through. I was like, “CANDACE, you have to snap a creepy creeper photo!” Challenge: accepted. She is the one who had the kitty ears and red pigtails.
Here’s me and Becky who was working the Vintage Shop area as the vintage toy expert! Our mutual friend tells me that Becky has a huuuuuuuge Hello Kitty collection! Also, me and MrHelloKittyBoy who is basically the nicest person you will ever meet! (pic stolen from his Insta)
After the first day, we had plans to have birthday dinner with Nellie from Quiet Tiger, so we burned some time by sharing a grilled cheese sandwich (we hadn’t eaten all day), shopping in Little Tokyo, and taking failed purikura!
I say it was a fail because that first shot was supposed to be our faces on Candace’s hands, but I messed mine up, and it looked stupid, so I put a cartoon face over it….
Anyway, that night, Candace finished knitting herself a humongous Hello Kitty bow head band, and I finished my book, which was my friend and former co-worker Jandy’s beautiful and amazing second novel I’ll Give You The Sun.
The next morning, we put in a room service order for Spam musubi before checking out! It had to be done!
This time we missed the window for the HK shuttle, so we used Uber instead. When we got there, Chrissa pulled us into the panel that was just starting, which ended up being Tarina Tarantino intervewing Kitty Mama! Kitty Mama has a great sense of humor!
Before the panel, we ran into Esther Kim of EstherLovesYou. I love her art so much! And then after the panel, fate allowed me to run into Andy Cordero, a cute tattoo artist I follow on Insta who came all the way from Miami! We hoped to run into each other and randomly did!
Candace and I then headed into the Japanese American National Museum to check out the Hello Kitty Museum stuff and art show. Again, I won’t post EVERYTHING, but just a taste.
Let’s not get into how Candace stood here and shot photos of every single item on this shelf.
Pretty sure that is me behind that closed door behind her.
OK this piece by Paul Frank is everything. The little rotor thingamabob (???) actually spun!
Here’s C by the Hello Kitty Cafe van. They sold out of everything except water bottles shaped liked bows and also little cakes, and we bought both! Apparently they are opening up a shop in LA next year… so fingers crossed!
We popped back into the MOCA really quick to check out some stuff, but my flight was leaving that night, and I didn’t want to miss it!
Oh yeah, here’s Candace at the charging station earlier trying to contact her friends who were going to give us a ride!
While waiting back at the hotel for her friends to pick us up, we ran into Benjie and Duckie! I met them when Benjie threw the Sweet Tooth art show, which I can’t believe was TWO YEARS AGO.
So that was our trip in a nut shell!! Quick, dirty, cute, and fun! Candace and I had been mulling over whether or not we were going to go to this thing for weeks, maybe months, but I’m glad we just decided to do it. To adventure!
