✦ San Francisco · Coming 2026 ✦
A Festival of Magnificent Weirdness
Coming 2026 · Frontier Tower · San Francisco
I'm In 🎪San Francisco is the city that gave the world drag nun exorcisms, pedal-powered Ferris wheels, and a man who shows up every day to protest the 12 Galaxies. It is a city where the circus never really left, the beatniks never really went home, and somebody is always burning something beautiful in the desert.
Whimsycon is a weekend gathering at Frontier Tower for the people who make San Francisco strange and magical — the fire sculptors and drag queens, the cacophonists and bicycle anarchists, the pirate supply store operators and guerrilla muralists, the professional clowns and amateur mystics who together constitute the city's weird, beating heart.
There will be costume parades and clown academies. There will be absurdist debates and fire art after dark. There will be treasure hunts through the city and drum circles that go until nobody has any drumming left. There will be a Big Wheel Grand Prix.
The only dress code is: wear something that makes a stranger smile.
A weekend gathering of SF's most whimsical archetypes
(Subject to chaos. Chaos is the point.)
There is no other dress code. Suggestions: your alter ego, your true self, or someone you'd like to be for 72 hours.
We gather, we introduce ourselves, and then we howl. All participants howl. The neighbors have been warned.
A 40-foot parade through a building lobby. Yes it counts. The Cyclecide mutant bikes will lead.
At midnight, one clue is distributed. Solve it and you'll find the after-party. Refuse to solve it and you'll also find the after-party. The riddle is actually easy; the point is the hunt.
Competitors: bring a big wheel. Or build one. Or improvise one from materials found at the venue. The only requirement is that you ride it down something at speed.
Jeff Raz teaches the basics: physical comedy, the red nose as philosophical stance, why clown is a way of being in the world. No water-squirting flowers unless you brought your own.
The Sisters preside. The criteria are mysterious. The winner receives a blessing. Everyone who enters is already blessed.
One hour. One blank wall. All participants. The Precita Eyes Muralists consult. The result is immediately declared a landmark.
Six speakers. Ten minutes each. Topics: a poisoning, a heist, a lost invention, a misidentified animal, a forgotten San Francisco street, and something involving a ghost ship. Guaranteed.
The Flaming Lotus Girls and Flux Foundation open the night. The sky turns orange. The neighbors have also been warned about this one.
Deep house, desert vibes, a bass line you'll feel in your bones. Until dawn or until noise ordinances prevail, whichever comes second.
Teams of 4 navigate San Francisco via clue, myth, and occasional mime. Frank Chu is a landmark. So is the Musée Mécanique. The City Lights basement counts as two points.
Four speakers. Two positions. Ten minutes each. Frank Chu moderates. No experience necessary. Conviction mandatory.
We walk through the neighborhood. In costume. With drums. Slowly. There is no destination. The walk is the destination.
We speak. We share. The confetti cannons fire. The drum circle begins. It does not stop for a very long time.
Frontier Tower sits at the edge of the possible — a gathering point for the city's most inventive, irrepressible, and improbable minds. Its halls have echoed with stranger conversations than you can imagine. Its walls have seen weirder things than you'll ever know. For one weekend in 2026, it becomes the temporary capital of San Francisco's permanent strangeness. All are welcome. Especially those in costume.
Are you one of us? You probably already know. Sign up and we'll find you when the time comes.