16th Annual Edwardian Ball Returns to San Francisco’s Regency Ballroom at Regency Ballroom

The 16th Edwardian Ball returns to the Regency Ballroom Friday and Saturday, January 22 and 23, 2016. The inimitable, description-defying, high camp, whimsical and surrealistic two-day festival, called the #1 Steampunk Event in the World on Buzzfeed, is a living interpretation and celebration of the stories of the late macabre cult author, comic artist, illustrator and cartoonist Edward Gorey.

Gorey is considered a ground-breaking, genre–defying graphic novelist who is credited with influencing Charles “Addams Family” Addams, Lemony Snicket, Neil Gaiman (Coraline and Day of the Dead), Rob Reger (Emily the Strange), Alison Bechdel,(Are You My Mother?: A Comic Drama and Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic), and Tim Burton (Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands, and Beetlejuice)....

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The 16th Edwardian Ball returns to the Regency Ballroom Friday and Saturday, January 22 and 23, 2016. The inimitable, description-defying, high camp, whimsical and surrealistic two-day festival, called the #1 Steampunk Event in the World on Buzzfeed, is a living interpretation and celebration of the stories of the late macabre cult author, comic artist, illustrator and cartoonist Edward Gorey.

Gorey is considered a ground-breaking, genre–defying graphic novelist who is credited with influencing Charles “Addams Family” Addams, Lemony Snicket, Neil Gaiman (Coraline and Day of the Dead), Rob Reger (Emily the Strange), Alison Bechdel,(Are You My Mother?: A Comic Drama and Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic), and Tim Burton (Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands, and Beetlejuice).

The Edwardian Ball, described by the SFWeekly as, “Think Vintage Fetish meets circus theatrics meets industrial arts mayhem,” blends live music, theatre, fashion and cosplay, circus, fine art, riveting stage shows, black comedy, science fiction, literature, ballroom dancing, and DJs into a whirlwind and enticing extravaganza set in a romanticized, gilded and genteel Neo-Victorian and Edwardian-era gothic and steampunk-tinged distant past that imagines an elegant alternate reality future. Other delightful attractions include the award-winning vendor bazaar, photo booth, mystical and nonsensical oddities, absinthe cocktails, steam machinery, parlour games, alluring sideshows, and much more. All ages are welcome.

This multi-city, multi-media exposition of the eccentric and esoteric the SF Bay Guardian calls a “Gothic, ghoulish and glorious celebration,” has grown over the past fifteen years from an underground club party into an internationally recognized festival of the arts, drawing attendees from all over the world, operating with the blessing of The Edward Gorey Charitable Trust. 944 Magazine calls The Edwardian Ball, “An over-the-top, colorful, quirky, eccentric, whimsical-yet-elegant costume party doesn’t even begin to describe the event.”

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