Hear ye, hear ye: Renn Fest rules change spurs furry furor

Shawna Passalaqua arrived at the Maryland Renaissance Festival last weekend in classic period garb — lace-up vest, flowing breeches and leather belt bag — and her own twist: a coyote mask, tail and fur-covered sleeves.

But, after making the two-hour drive from her New Jersey home, Passalaqua, 35, was turned away at the gates of the Crownsville festival, she said. The reason? Her animal-inspired outfit.

“I’m really angry,” said Passalaqua, who identifies as a member of the furry fandom. “This isn’t how renn fairs used to be. This safe inclusive space for 50 years has completely switched overnight.”

There’s a battle astir in Revel Grove, as the festival’s grounds are called, and it doesn’t involve knights or mad kings.

Renaissance festival leaders announced last spring a number of costume restrictions, including a ban on fursuits — full-body plush costumes, similar to a mall Easter Bunny or sports mascot suit — worn by members of the furry subculture.

“Our decision to specifically prohibit fursuits is based on repeated incidents with patrons wearing said costumes at the festival,” the announcement read, accusing fursuit wearers of engaging in “behaviors that have made other patrons uncomfortable,” “unauthorized performances” and “the open refusal to respect or cooperate with festival staff/security/and first aid.”

In a May interview, festival President Jules Smith Jr. said Revel Grove had been plagued in recent years by a plethora of plush wearers preening and posing for photos.

“We don’t want them performing,” Smith said. “Our experience is that they are constantly engaging other customers.”

Smith did not immediately respond to questions this week about the incident involving Passalaqua.

“We’re encouraging people to come in costume appropriate to the Renaissance history,” Smith said in May. “We’d like to have people show up and support our theme.”

Many Renaissance-loving furries feel they are being unfairly attacked. They were fair fans long before they donned a fursuit, and there’s a high degree of overlap between the two subcultures. Both involve costuming, fantasy and community.

The furry subculture traces its origins to the 1970s and ’80s comics subculture, and it took off online in the late ’90s and early 2000s, according to The Guardian. Dozens of conventions around the world draw furries each year, including the massive Anthrocon in Pittsburgh and FurTheMore in Baltimore.

While being a furry is a kink for some, many furries say they engage in only G-rated behavior in their suits, which allow them to freely express their personalities. Many furries are afraid to publicly share their pastime for fear of losing their jobs. Several state legislatures have introduced bills targeted at furries in recent years, and someone set off a chlorine bomb at a 2014 Illinois furry convention.

The Maryland Renn Fest was a “treasured place for me” said Ashton Hawthorne, 33, of Virginia, who attends fairs along the East Coast as his furry alter ego, or fursona, an orange-maned wolf with a Robin Hood aesthetic.

“In the climate we’re in, these safe spaces of free expression are so limited,” said Hawthorne, who asked to be identified by his role-playing name for fear of being fired if outed as a furry.

Hawthorne said, in the past, he has met up with four or five other fursuit wearers at the festival for shopping, eating, chatting and listening to music. He said he briefly joined a larger gathering of about two dozen furries on the last day of the 2025 festival but left quickly due to the crowds.

“I’m not there to perform. I’m not there to make a spectacle of myself,” Hawthorne said. “I’m there to exist in the space in a way that makes me happy.”

Some longtime festival attendees say the influx of furries in recent years, along with “Star Wars” stormtroopers, Trekkies, Doctors Who, steampunks, inflatable dinosaurs and other off-themed patrons, detracts from Revel Grove’s revelries.

Hayes Preston, 55, of Elkridge, said he’s been attending the festival, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary, since he was a child. He didn’t appreciate the shift to a “fantasy comicon kind of thing” in recent years and welcomes the new rules.

Preston said he saw far fewer patrons in off-theme costumes last weekend than in recent years.

“The vibes seemed chiller,” he said. “People just wanting to be there, to be at a Renaissance festival.”

But many furries and their allies who are boycotting this year’s festival say they very much would like to attend but are offended by the fursuit ban.

“It becomes a slippery slope,” said Ash Delmonico, 27, of Jacksonville, Florida, who usually travels to Maryland each year for the festival.

Delmonico said he feels furries are unfairly maligned. He has found fellowship, inspiration and free expression in his fursona, a green deer named Cedar.

“I know that’s weird,” said Delmonico, a writer. “A lot of people assume that we don’t know that we’re weird. We do know.”

Delmonico chafes against the assumption that furry culture revolves around costumed sex.

While some furries do engage in sexual activity, it never occurs in public or areas where minors are present, he said.

“If someone would do that, they would be shamed in the furry community,” Delmonico said.

Longtime Renn Fest attendee Arden Winner, 31, of Baltimore, said she understands both sides of the furry debate. A former employee of a fair costuming vendor who has spent hundreds of days in Revel Grove, Winner appreciates the fair aesthetic— even if it’s historically inaccurate.

“The Renn Faire has its own visual language,” she said, noting that costumes have long been a subject of debate. “One camp is leaning close to historical re-creation,” she said. “Some want the fair to be a safe space for everyone to celebrate their weirdness.”

Passalaqua, the New Jersey woman who said she was barred from entry last weekend, said the Maryland festival no longer feels like a safe space for her.

She said her costume, which included an easily removable mask and boots that resemble coyote paws, abided by guidelines on the festival’s website. Even after she removed her mask, she was not allowed to enter Revel Grove.

“When someone sees furries they think all this negative stuff, but it’s really just a collection of artists,” said Passalaqua, who grooms special needs dogs for a living. “I’m just a person who wanted to participate in his fair.”