It’s been a difficult year in southern California, with deadly wildfires, immigration raids that have that left communities in fear and thousands of soldiers deployed to Los Angeles. In downtown Pasadena over the weekend, though, the region received a badly needed dose of joy.
On Saturday and Sunday, thousands of cat lovers flocked to the city for a weekend dedicated to all things feline. Inside the city convention center, there were 200 kittens waiting to be adopted and hundreds of vendors selling everything a cat lover could dream of: treats, charmingly kitschy tees, crocheted beds and medieval period-inspired portraits of regal cats.
This is CatCon, or as one guest described it: “Disneyland for cat people.”
“It’s cuteness overload,” said Bianca Chapman, who has attended the conference for the past four years. “I can’t stop smiling. I leave here with my face sore.”
There is no event for the cat-inclined quite like CatCon, which brings together products, educational workshops, the celebrities of the kitty world – human and feline – and, of course, cat lovers themselves. Here the question is not Do you have a cat?, but How many cats do you have?
More than 10,000 people attended the two-day event and tickets sold out for both days. An entire weekend dedicated wholly to cats seemed particularly special for people this year given the hardships across the Los Angeles area in recent months.
“CatCon is a place where you can close out the outside world, and commune with people over our love of animals,” said Susan Michals, the event’s founder. “It’s really a happy place, and it’s just good fun celebrating our kitty friends.”
This year marked the expo’s 10th anniversary. Michals, a former journalist and TV producer, founded the event in 2015 as cat fever was taking the US by storm with iconic cats such as Lil Bub, Grumpy cat and Nala garnering millions of followers online and endless cat memes proliferating on seemingly every corner of the internet.
A lifelong cat lover, Michals had already founded Cat Art Show and saw that event drew a younger audience who deeply loved cats and didn’t fit the spinster persona so commonly associated with feline enthusiasts in popular culture.
“There’s still that negative connotation. I realized there was a sort of an underserved and untapped population of cat lovers that were not being represented,” she said. “And that’s how CatCon was born.”
CatCon opened its doors in 2015 with Michals aiming to deliver a curated event with workshops, meet-and-greets and hip new products. Ultimately, Michals said, her goal has been to elevate what it means to be a cat person, debunking the cat lady myth while giving back to shelters and advocacy groups.
“It’s based in community. There was no IRL dog park for the cat enthusiast, because cats are cats,” she said as her own cat, the 20-year-old Miss Kitty Pretty Girl, meowed in the background, as if on cue.
The event has further exploded in popularity amid a pandemic-fueled rise in pet ownership. Many visitors are repeat attendees who come each year with friends or family.
CatCon is diverse with a mix of all genders, races and ages. Most people wore something cat-themed, such as crocheted tails and sparkly cat ears, and, in at least one case, a full leather cat woman costume.
Sophia Zavala, dressed in cheetah-print pants, cat ears and a shirt from last year’s event that reads “stop staring at my kitties”, has come for the last three years with her best friend to check out the latest products.
“I think it allows the crazy cat ladies to come together. I get to hang out with my best friend without our husbands,” she said with a chuckle. “We spend with no limits. Both our husbands made us save up for today.”
For mother and daughter Dulce Figueroa and Angely Mata, who have attended multiple times since 2017, the event was a bonding experience and a chance to be among fellow cat people.
“You know everybody here loves cats,” Figueroa said. “It’s just fun.”
On the other side of the 55,000 sq ft exhibition hall, Tamara Bencivenga and her son, nephew and their friend stood at the front of a long line. They were there to meet Sponge Cake and Buttercream, two extremely popular globetrotting Scottish folds. It was a union years in the making for the LA-area family.
They had tried to meet the famous felines in Las Vegas and New York without success, but on Saturday, Bencivenga and the children, wearing cat ears and light blue shirts adorned with an ode to the cats and their owner, got the chance to pet them and say hello.
“They seemed a little shy, but they just sat still and let us pet them,” Bencivenga said afterward, as the children gleefully recalled how “cute and chunky” they were.
Nearby, another celebrity feline known as “Cat Named Calvin” was attracting a line of fans.
Besides the handful of celebrity cats, there are no actual felines roaming CatCon (people aren’t permitted to bring the animals), and that made one corner particularly popular. The Pasadena Humane Society, which has continued to house animals displaced by this year’s fires, was running an adoption village featuring 200 kittens.
People waited in some cases upwards of 30 minutes to greet the cats. On Saturday alone, more than 100 were adopted. Each time, a staffer would ring a bell and cheers would follow across the hall.
James Madrid took home a tiny, nimble, yet to be named black kitten as a companion for his four-year-old cat, Momo. His girlfriend had suggested they go to CatCon, and he was eager to join.
“I love cats, man,” he said. “I grew up with cats. I come from a cat family.”
Bianca Chapman, the owner of three black cats named for Egyptian queens, has attended CatCon for the last four years, and makes a point to come alone because she always meets people.
Along with the cat ears and tails, there are no shortage of cheeky political statements, such as shirts reading “proud parent of a gay cat” or “childless cat lady” and even an almost familiar-looking red hat with the slogan “Make cats safe again”.
J Morrison, a Brooklyn-based artist and longtime vendor at CatCon, sells art based on his own Siamese cat with slogans such as “Kittens against Trump”. His booth was popular and often crowded on Saturday, something he attributed to a humorous message that resonated with people.
There is a spirit of diversity and inclusion at CatCon that is special, Chapman said, particularly in this moment. People feel accepted here, she said, wearing cat ears and a small stuffed cat on her shoulder, and shelters and stray cats are showcased and celebrated.
“It’s a beautiful response to what’s happening right now,” she said. “When you have a pet, you can’t help but be tender. I think people are yearning for that.
“CatCon is showing you can be tender and goofy at any age. People are still finding joy – and even activism in their joy.”
