The Southwest Costumers Guild is a loose and informal educational society of persons interested in all facets of historical, cultural, science fiction, fantasy, and humor costume and cosplay. Members are often seen on stage and behind the scenes at Science Fiction Convention masquerades, historical reenactment events, street fairs and theatre. SWCG is central Arizona's chapter of the International Costume Guild.

Our Website is now hosted by Costume.org!

Please note that info@southwestcostumersguild.org and our other former "southwestcostumersguild.org" e-mail addresses are not currently active.
Please contact us via our new e-mail:  southwestcostumers@gmail.com.

Index
Newsletter
Costumers Calendar
SWCG Activities
Meet the Guildsters - Mail Links and links to Member Web Pages
Links - Web Sites of Interest to the Costumer
Hints and other "How To" Articles

Randwulf's Smartphone Pouch - Free sewing pattern from SWCG VP Randall
 
Join the Southwest Costumers Guild

Recruiting and PR Materials:
"Renaissance Faire" Foldover Flyer
(Featuring a practical belt pouch pattern)
Quarter-Page Flyer
Bookmark

SWCG Bylaws

 
SWCG members receive our newsletter, "Cactus Needles" by e-mail.
A few weeks after its initial publication, we post Cactus Needles to this website for all to enjoy.

Current Issue -  June 2024
Back Issues (All the way back to the Cactus Needles premiere in 1994)



Cactus Needles is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please print the newsletter and give it to your friends, but print the entire newsletter and don't make any changes or charge any money. Go to www.creativecommons.org to view the license. Individual articles and pictures belong to their authors. If you'd like to reprint an individual article or picture, please e-mail southwestcostumers@gmail.com for appropriate permission.

February 14-July 7, 2024 -- The Phoenix Art Museum is having two exhibits running together in the Fashion-Design Mezzanine, "The Power of Pink" and "Barbie: A Cultural Icon". "The Power of Pink" explores the complex history of the popular yet controversial color and its impact on fashion and pop culture. The items shown are entirely from the museum's fashion-design collection. "Barbie: A Cultural Icon" traces the 60+ year  evolution of Barbie, from child’s toy to global icon. See more than 250 vintage dolls—including the original Barbie and all 22 original ensemble outfits. And much more. Phoenix Art Museum, 1625 N. Central Ave., Phoenix, AZ https://phxart.org 

July 12-14, 2024 - Medieval Mayhem Renaissance Faire at Frontier Field, 650 North 9th Place, Show Low, Arizona. https://www.azmayhem.com/

August 9-11, 2024 - Bisbee Pirate Weekend at Bisbee City Park.

August 30-September 2, 2024 - Saboten Con at Sheraton Grand Phoenix Downtown, 340 North 3rd Street, Phoenix

August 30-September1, 2024 - Tucson Comic*Con at Tucson Convention Center, 260 South Church Avenue, Tucson https://azfandom.org/cons/tucsoncomiccon.html

September 7, 2024 - Fandomania at Findlay Toyota Center in Prescott Valley, Arizona. https://www.prescottvalley-az.gov/1349/Fandomania

October 13, 2023 - Howl O Ween Parade at Tlaquepaque Arts & Shopping Village in Sedona, Arizona. Costume parade to benefit Humane Society of Sedona.  https://visitsedona.com/events-calendar/howl-o-ween-costume-parade1/

October 19, 2024 - Phoenix Winter Fantasy Ball 2024: A Night Under the Mountain at Ashley Castle, 1300 S. Price Road, Chandler

Join us for our 2nd annual Phoenix Winter Fantasy Ball! This event is hosted by Un Jour D’Amour and will be a fantasy/cosplay black tie affair gala with hors d’œuvres, dinner, drinks, a vendor marketplace, & entertainment provided. A portion of proceeds from the ball will be donated to multiple animal shelters around the valley, including the Arizona Humane Society, Arizona Small Dog Rescue, MCSO MASH Unit, Saving Paws Rescue, & HALO Animal Rescue. a nit, Saving Paws Rescue, & HALO Animal Rescue. https://www.fantastiquecollection.com/phx-winter-fantasy-ball-2024

November 8-10, 2024 - TusCon in Tucson.  https://tusconscificon.com/

January 25, 2025 - Tempe FanCon at Tempe Public Library, SWC Rural Road & Southern Avenue. "Comic and cosplay fans grab your capes and superpowers and come to the Tempe Public Library for a celebration of comics and pop culture. Join us for free family fun including costume contests, authors and artists, entertainment, activities for the kids, photo ops with characters, fandom related items for sale, and food trucks."  https://www.tempepubliclibrary.org/event-calendar/tempe-fancon

March 20-23, 2024 - Wild Wild West Steampunk Convention at Casino del Sol, Tucson, Arizona. https://www.wildwestcon.com/

February 24-March 2, 2025 - End of Trail at Arizona Game & Fish Ben Avery Shooting Facility. The Single-Action Shooting Society's annual tournament of cowboy action shooting.The event features a sutler's row of merchants for filling out your wild west/victorian/steampunk costume. https://endoftrail.org/

CASFS Book & Media Social

Your Webmaster also organizes a monthly activity of the Central Arizona Speculative Fiction Society's (CASFS) Book and Media Social.  We get together once a month to talk about a pre-selected book, film or other media experience for a bit. After that, conversation can go anywhere. We meet at 7PM on the third Tuesday of every month at the Denny's restaurant at the northeast corner of 35th Avenue and Bethany Home Road in Phoenix. We run a Zoom meeting in parallel to the in-person one, so you can participate even if you can't get your corpus to Phoenix.

Check out the CASFS Book & Media Social Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/1602983896683877, the AZ Fandom Facebook Group and the CASFS web page at http://casfs.org/book_social.html for directions to the meeting or the Zoom link or e-mail books@casfs.org

Here is the book list for the rest of 2023:

July 16, 2024 The Road to Roswell by Connie Willis
August 20, 2024  The Rules of Supervillainy by CT Phipps
September 17, 2024 The Spare Man by Mary Robinette Kowal
October 15, 2024 Witch King by Martha Wells
November 19, 2024 Leviathan Wakes by James SA Corey
December 17, 2024 How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Django Wexler

Return to Index