It’s been a few weeks since New Zealand’s first hotel furry convention wrapped up, and I’m here with a post-event report. This isn’t going to be anything close to a full overview of everything that happened over the weekend - if I did this article would be a few thousand words long!

First off, I highly recommend you check out the amazing video Steferd put together for the event. I think it does a great job of capturing the weekend. So stop reading, and enjoy.

From the start of the event, the open common spaces of the Holiday Inn were bustling from the morning until late in the night. For most of the weekend, the weather was clear and warm, with a few short bursts of rain. There were usually a few groups of people sitting outside around the pool (or taking a dip!). There was a constant flow of people heading to and from panels and the hotel bar to get food and drinks.

Including day passes, there were 380 attendees in total – easily smashing the previous record of 181 for a New Zealand event set by FurcoNZ Camp 2022.

The Dealer’s Den was busy throughout the event, with FurcoNZ merch also on offer. There were several international dealers with one (Gaius) even making the journey from Canada! On offer were socks, collars and tags, dice (a lot of dice), fursuits, commissions, art prints, props and accessories, stickers, and quite frankly a lot of other things that would be far too much to list.

A list of dealers has been included below for anyone looking to grab any goods that they missed out on at con.

Every evening had a full schedule of dances DJed by local and overseas talent, including one night with live music performances.

The dances were all streamed online on Twitch and to the FurcoNZ custom world in VRChat. There was also a two-way portal set up, so those in VR could chat with and see attendees at the event.

The fursuit parade was held on Sunday evening, and the weather was perfect, with a breeze and blue skies. The short parade ran though the hotel corridors…

…and ended with a gathering outside for a group photo. There was (by a big margin) the largest group of fursuits I have ever seen in one place in New Zealand. In total, we counted 109 fursuits.

There were so many other events and panels over the weekend that I wasn’t able to find time to attend (or couldn’t find photos of to share). FurcoNZ Hotel this year was an amazing event and I’ll definitely be back next time!

FurcoNZ Camp is returning in 2025 with this years theme being Howloween! The event will be returning to the Forest Lakes camp in Ōtaki, the same venue as previous recent camp events. The event is scheduled for May 8-11^th (not halloween). The event will be held from a Thursday to a Sunday instead of the Friday to Monday of previous FurcoNZ Camp events.

The event was annouced with a spooky video during the closing ceremony of this years hotel event. Details are still limited, but registration will be opening just over two weeks from now, on the 15^th of December.

Major updates will be posted on furry.nz, but as always, the best place for news will be the official Camp 2025 website and the FurcoNZ Telegram group!

With just over two weeks to go, FurcoNZ Hotel 2024 is growing closer and closer. If you haven’t registered already, registration for Premium is still open for a few more days, so get in quick!

Day passes will also be available during the event.

As a reminder, FurcoNZ recommends you join the FurcoNZ News channel on Telegram for updates during the event!

Haere mai e te whanau Furry o Aotearoa - FurcoNZ has been confirmed for 2022! The convention will be held February 11^th-14^th, at the Forest Lakes Camping & Convention Center, Ōtaki!

We’ll be announcing more details and activities over the coming weeks - please sign up to our newsletter, or follow us on social media to keep up to date with information as it’s released. You can view the dates that tickets will go on sale on the Registration page above. Note that you don’t have to pay immediately - the deadlines for each type of ticket are listed under each item.

Unlike previous years, we are opening overnight attendance to those aged 14 and up, with particular conditions on younger attendees. If you are <18, please review our Youth Information page for more information!

We are also open to overseas attendees, subject of course to government advice. In order to make this easier, we’re offering an extended period to receive a full refund if travel is not possible by the time of the convention. See our International Attendees page for more information.

Finally, please familiarize yourself with our COVID-19 policy before signing up. In particular, we will be requiring proof of vaccination for all attendees - so if you haven’t already, take this as the excuse to finally go out and get vaccinated!

The best way to keep up to date with news as well as meeting other attendees is to join our Telegram chat over at https://t.me/furconz - Telegram is the main communications hub for most of the NZ Furry Community.

We look forwards to seeing you all at FurcoNZ in February!

Registration is now open for Southern Paws 2021! You can register for the event at their site using the link below.

Visit the official Southern Paws website.

Southern Paws has announced that they will be running their second event this year, running from the 30^th of April to the 3^rd of May. This event will be held at the same location as in 2019 — the Waipara Adventure Center about 40 minutes north of Christchurch. The event has been extended by one night, now operating as a three-night convention (like FurCoNZ)

The theme for this years event is Space Westerns. Bascially, think Firefly. Both spacecraft and cowboy hats!

Registration isn’t open yet, but details can be found on the Southern Paws website. There’s also an official Telegram group, which you can join by following the link in the big purple box on the website.

We are pleased to announce furry.nz is now hosting a static archive of the original furry.org.nz website. Give the logo below a click to head to the archive and check it out!

The furry.org.nz website was created by Colin Raccoon in 2001 to support the NZFurs mailing list. Based on the successful OZFurry mailing list, this was an early way for Furry Fans in NZ to find like minded people, discuss their fandom, and plan events.

Over time the site added features including a Directory of NZ Furs and their characters, a birthday and event calendar, a web forum, and links to popular fandom sites. The mailing list and website served the growing community well, but by the 2010s the rise of Facebook groups and IM/chat apps such as Telegram and Discord provided more immediate and interactive ways to communicate and activity declined. After Colin passed away in 2014 the site was maintained by Nipper and Kyhwana without significant changes for several years.

With an archive of the original site now established, we will redirect furry.org.nz traffic to our new site here.

Check out some of our early logos below.

furry.nz

This new furry.nz site is intended to provide persistent login accounts for NZ furry events such as Southern Paws and FurCoNZ, so that attendees do not have to create separate new accounts for each event each year. We also have an event calendar for upcoming NZ and regional furry events, and a blog for news and announcements.

We eventually hope to add a more modern version of the NZ Furry Directory, allowing users to share character bios and pictures, and contact information such as Twitter handles or Discord usernames.

Our thanks go out to Sandwalker for maintaining the Directory, Kyhwana for helping maintain the site over the years, and Kakapo for developing the new furry.nz

With less than one month left to go, FurCoNZ 2020 is coming up quickly! FurCoNZ will be held from January 30^th – February 2^nd, 2020.

Though all sponsor and premium-tier tickets are sold out, FurCoNZ still has plenty of regular tickets remaining (and a handful of day passes). Regular ticket registration should be open until the 16^th of January. So, if you’re interested in going, you still have a chance to make it.

You can find more information on their official website or go right to ordering a ticket.

FurDU is excited to announce that their main hotel has been fully booked out, and the neighboring ones are filling up fast! You may need to book ASAP to avoid missing out. Registration is also close to selling out with under 180 left so get in NOW!

https://furdu.com.au/