2018 Kigurumi Chronicle

The 2019-2025 volumes are complete. Following the one-year-backward rule, this edition covers 2018 only. Verifiable material is concentrated in public-event rules for kigurumi safety and photography and in a graduate study of an animegao-mask production matching service. Undated specialist gatherings are not converted into facts.

Scope and sources

This page treats only explicit dates, venues, rules, and thesis metadata as facts. AnimeJapan was a general anime convention, not an animegao event; it is relevant because its rules directly name kigurumi, masks, visibility, attendants, photography, and changing. Keio University's repository separately confirms a 2018 master's thesis directly concerned with animegao kigurumi mask production and order matching.

Verified chronology

March 24-25: AnimeJapan 2018 extends public-space rules for kigurumi

AnimeJapan 2018's public days ran March 24-25 in Tokyo Big Sight East Halls 1-8. Cosplayers World used East Halls 3 and 8 and provided paid cosplay registration, changing rooms, cloakrooms, indoor and outdoor photography areas, early changing, and a parade.¹²

The base rules confining vision- and movement-limiting costumes to cosplay areas, requiring photography consent, and protecting changing-room privacy were already present in 2017; see the 2017 volume. The distinct 2018 update was an expanded East Hall 3 and 8 footprint and a parade rule requiring one attendant for a participant whose kigurumi or headwear obstructed vision.²

The page continued the consent, pose, changing-room, and cloakroom provisions. This volume does not count those continuing provisions as new 2018 rules; the year's unique governance node is the larger venue footprint and explicit parade-attendant responsibility.

Academic year 2018: animegao mask production enters graduate research

Keio University's repository records Haruka Jibiki's master's thesis, “Construction of a matching service for animegao-kigurumi mask production: through the activities of mask order-to-sales business ‘Kigurumi-Ya,’” advised by Kazunori Sugiura and published by the Graduate School of Media Design. The record describes x + 65 pages and classifies it as Media Design thesis no. 689 for academic year 2018.³⁴

The title itself establishes mask production, maker matching, and Kigurumi-Ya's order-sales activity as the research subject. Because the repository supplies no abstract, this archive does not infer methods, sample size, or outcomes. The durable claim is narrower: production supply, commissioning, and service design had become a formal master's research topic.

Domain assessment

Domain	Verified 2018 material	Decision
Chronicle	AnimeJapan public days and Cosplayers World	Include directly relevant rules; do not relabel the convention as a specialist gathering
Daily life / discussion	Movement, cloakroom use, and photography in a public cosplay venue	Organizer material only
Workshop / craft	Master's thesis on an animegao mask-production matching service	Include title and repository metadata only
Etiquette / safety	Limited vision, attendants, consent, and changing-room privacy	Include
Encyclopedia / education	Distinguish animegao production, general cosplay, and large kigurumi	Include
Academic	Keio Media Design master's thesis for academic year 2018	Include

De-duplication and conclusion

This volume does not repeat FGO's 2019 official-kigurumi appearance, the cancellation and online shift of 2020, the hybrid recovery of 2021, or the specialist events, Doll Weekends, official greetings, and later rules already assigned to 2022-2025. No first-party source was found that established the date, place, and outcome of a specialist 2018 animegao gathering, so that gap remains explicit.

The strongest 2018 conclusion has two layers: public-event governance added a parade-attendant duty to established visibility, movement, and photography boundaries; mask-production commissioning and maker matching entered graduate research. One node is an incremental change in venue operations, the other organizes knowledge and production. Together they form a useful annual record without enlarging the evidence.

Sources

---

1. AnimeJapan, “AnimeJapan 2018 Event Outline,” https://anime-japan.jp/2018/about/outline/ ↩

2. AnimeJapan, “Cosplayers World,” https://anime-japan.jp/2018/main/cosplay/ ↩↩

3. Keio University Academic Repository, “Construction of a matching service for animegao-kigurumi mask production: through the activities of mask order-to-sales business ‘Kigurumi-Ya,’” https://koara.lib.keio.ac.jp/xoonips/modules/xoonips/detail.php?koara_id=KO40001001-00002018-0689 ↩

4. National Diet Library Search, aggregated thesis record, https://ndlsearch.ndl.go.jp/books/R000000025-I012760004076179 ↩