World Cosplay Summit

The World Cosplay Summit (世界コスプレサミット), also known as WCS, is an annual international cosplay event that promotes friendly international exchange through Japanese pop culture. The event is hosted by TV Aichi and held in Nagoya, Japan. Since 2005 the event has held a cosplay contest, the World Cosplay Championship, thus the preliminary contests for the championship have been held in the respective countries of the participants. Because of the keen attention from abroad, as of 2008, three ministries of Japan give support to the event; the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MLIT), and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). Since 2005, the event is held over a two day period; the Cosplayer Parade is on the first day and the Cosplay Championship is on the second day.

History
The first WCS was held in 2003, to introduce international popularity of Japanese anime and manga besides the fans through cosplayers, and to brighten up Expo 2005 in Nagoya.

2003
The first event was held on October 12 at Rose Court Hotel in Nagoya. 5 cosplayers were invited from Germany, France and Italy, and panels and photo session, etc. were done. TV Aichi, the host of the WCS, covered the anime and manga circumstances of Frankfurt (Germany), Paris (France) and Rome (Italy), and produced a documentary of the event, "MANGA is a lingua franca of the world" (MANGAは世界の共通語). The program was broadcasted on November 24.

2004
Held on August 1 at Ōsu shopping area in Naka-ku, Nagoya. 8 cosplayers were invited from France, Italy and the United States. The Cosplayer Parade came to be held from this year. 100 Japanese cosplayers participated the parade at the first year with the abroad cosplayers.

2005
The event took two locations: the Cosplayer Parade was held at Osu on July 31 and the Cosplay Championship was held at Expo Dome on August 7 during Expo 2005. 40 people per seven country participate to the first Cosplay Championship, and the contest was won by Italy. A purpose of the event was to brighten up Expo 2005 in Nagoya therefore host organizer of the Expo (the Japan Association for the 2005 World Exposition) supported the WCS in 2005.

2006
The venue for the Cosplay Championship was moved to Oasis 21 in Higashi-ku, Nagoya. From this year, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MLIT) support the event.

2007
The venue for the Cosplay Championship at Oasis 21 in Higashi-ku, Nagoya.

The event became a part of the 2007 "Visit Japan" campaign of the MLIT.


 * In this year have problem with the weather.

2008
The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) joined the event to support.

Regulation

 * Wear a costume that conforms to the concept of the event. (Japanese manga, animation or video game characters).
 * Doujinshi or unique characters from live actor movies based on anime or manga are not permitted.
 * When doing a costume from a game, the character must be recognizably Japanese.
 * It is permissible for family and friends to help with costumes, but basically it is preferable that costumes are hand-made by the contestants themselves.

Results

 * Group Champion: 🇫🇷 France (Pauline Mesa, Laurence Guermond Wendy Roeltgen)
 * Individual Champion: 🇮🇹 Giorgia Vecchini
 * 3rd: 🇮🇹 Italy (Alessandro Leuti, Alessia de Magistris)

Report Ranking World Cosplay Summit 2009
Rank Competition

Guest Judges of World Cosplay Championship 2009 Go Nagai,Toru Furuya, Ichiro Mizuki, Hamada Britney,10 general judge
 * 1. 🇯🇵 Japan Team (Sengoku Basara)YuRi,RiE
 * 2. 🇪🇸 Spain Team (Candy Candy)Laura Fernandez,Berenic Serrano
 * 3. 🇺🇸 USA Team (Sakura)Elizabeth Licata,India Davis

(From 15 Countries - Australia, Brazil, China, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland, France, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Singapore, Thailand, United States)

Attending countries
(Attending countries in bold indicate first attend)

Partner organizations or events
The following organizations have held the preliminary contests to select the representative of the country for the Cosplay championship since 2005.
 * 🇦🇺 Animania
 * 🇧🇷 Editora JBC
 * Howell International Trade Fair Ltd.
 * 🇩🇰 J-Popcon (da:J-Popcon)
 * 🇩🇪 Animexx / Connichi
 * 🇫🇮 Cosplay Finland Tour (since 2009)
 * 🇫🇷 Japan Expo
 * 🇮🇹 ROMICS (it:Romics)
 * 🇯🇵 Cosplay Festa in Tokyo Dome City (Tokyo)
 * 🇯🇵 Cosplayers JAM Revolution (Osaka)
 * 🇰🇷 Samsung Everland
 * 🇲🇽 TNT GT
 * 🇸🇬 SCC Square
 * 🇪🇸 FICOMIC / Salón del Manga (es:Ficomic / es:Salón del Manga de Barcelona)
 * 🇹🇭 Negibose Thailand / Oishi Group
 * 🇺🇸 FanimeCon

Former partner organizations or events

 * Hangzou True Design Company Ltd. (2005–2007)
 * 🇫🇷 Epitanime (2005)
 * 🇺🇸 Anime Expo (2005)

Official website

 * World Cosplay Summit official website -
 * Official website for WCS 2010 -
 * Archives: 2003 -
 * Archives: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 -

Partner organizations' websites

 * 🇧🇷 Etapa JBC Brasil - (Portuguese)
 * 🇩🇰 Danish Cosplay Summit - (Danish)
 * 🇩🇪 World Cosplay Summit - (German)
 * 🇫🇮 Cosplay Finland - (Finnish)

Cosplay summit Tour

 * World Cosplay Summit official tour website in JAPANiCAN.com -
 * World Cosplay Summit tour 2009 in JAPANiCAN.com -

Other reference sites

 * Brazilian Preliminaries
 * "Dressed To Impress" from Trends in Japan

World Cosplay Summit World Cosplay Summit World Cosplay Summit World Cosplay Summit World Cosplay Summit 世界コスプレサミット World Cosplay Summit