When I first started, or restarted, my journey in magic, I didn't realize there were annual conventions held each year. I should have since there are conventions for just about everything, but I was busy reading and learning and practicing. When I finally started hearing about this and that, well, 2020 hit and they all kind of shut down.
I spoke to some friends about conventions and if they ever attended, I was kind of surprised at the split opinions. I can understand "not attending" vs "attending", but more than one friend was adamantly opposed to attending magic conventions. With engineers (my day-job), our conventions tend to have a lot of vendors; you get swag if you listen to a sales pitch or check out their newest "thing", but mostly it's presentations by other engineers and drinking at the open bar. I would expect a magic convention to be similar except, maybe more magic in between presentations? Either way, I'm pro-attending.
But yeah, back to the main topic! So, things started picking back up this year and I've heard about a few different upcoming conventions from around the globe and wanted to share some of that info with y'all. Also, I'm sure there are plenty more than what I've listed below -- these are purely just the conventions I've either heard about or found when looking for specific areas:
October 2022
- French Championship of Magic
- When: October 27th - 30th
- Where: Cannes / Mandelieu, France
- More Info
November 2022
- Daytona Beach Festival of Magic
- When: November 4th - 6th
- Where: Daytona, Florida
- More Info
- The London Magic Convention
- When: November 6th
- Where: London, England
- More Info
January 2023
- The Session
- When: January 13th - 15th
- Where: London, England
- More Info
- MagiFest
- When: January 26th - 28th
- Where: Columbus, Ohio
- More Info
February 2023
- Blackpool Convention
- When: February 16th - 19th
- Where: Blackpool, England
- More Info
March 2023
- Winter Carnival of Magic
- When: March 9th - 11th
- Where: Pigeon Forge, Tennessee
- More Info
- Portland Magic Jam
- When: March 24th - 26th
- Where: Portland, Oregon
- More Info
April 2023
- Obie's 4F Invitation Only Convention (Fechter's Finger Flicking Frolic)
- When: April 26th - 29th
- Where: Batavia, NY
- More Info
- This one's invite only, unfortunately. Though, maybe that's a good thing?
- MagiCon
- When: April 29th - May 1st
- Where: Belfast, Ireland
- More Info
I already bought a ticket for Blackpool in February. I doubt I'll attend any others between now and then, though I really do want to do The Session and MagiFest but that's a lot of travel, not sure my family would appreciate that too much =P. Maybe the next one though!
There's also Magic LIVE! that is held in Vegas over the summer, but that's so far out from now that I didn't list it above. I've heard that it's quite a fun one, so maybe it'll make its way onto my "to do" list soon.
If you know of any other magic conventions that I didn't list here, please let me know =]