Your first kink event, and what nobody will expect of you
No gear. No experience. Nobody keeping score.
What the weekend actually looks like
AKW runs Thursday through Sunday. Thursday and Friday are the quieter end: smaller gatherings, early panels, and a pace that lets you get your bearings. Saturday is the big one, with a full day of classes, the Gear Market, title contests, and evening parties. Sunday winds down.
Your schedule is yours, and nobody is tracking how much of it you use. Sit in on a class. Watch a title contest from the audience. Browse the Gear Market. Go to a party, or sit in the hotel bar and talk to people, or go back to your room at nine because you are tired. All of those are people having a normal AKW.
If you want a low-pressure place to start, watching is genuinely a thing here rather than a consolation prize. The Bootblack Lounge runs across the weekend and you can stand and watch people work. A title contest is a few hours of sitting in an audience. Both are real parts of the event that ask nothing of you.
Coming on your own
A lot of people do, and the ones who have been coming for years mostly started that way.
Thursday and Friday are the easier entry if you want to arrive before the weekend is at full volume. Meals and the hotel bar do more social work than any organized mixer: sitting down next to someone at breakfast is how most people here met most people here.
What you agree to when you buy a ticket
Buying a ticket means signing AKW's Code of Conduct and the event's Agreement and Release of Liability, which covers conduct, photography, and refunds. Read them. They are short, and they are the actual rules rather than a formality.
Legal ID is required at check-in. Violations can mean removal from the event, and serious ones can mean you are not welcome back. AKW can also decline admission without giving a reason.
Your first hour
Find check-in first. It is the one place on site whose entire job is answering questions, and telling them it is your first AKW is a normal thing to say rather than an admission. They will tell you what is running, where the rooms are, and which spaces are quiet right now.
There is no orientation session or first-timer meet-up, so check-in is the whole of the staffed welcome. That is worth knowing rather than hunting for: if you are waiting for an official start, this is it.
After that, pick one thing on Thursday or Friday and go to it. One class or one panel is plenty for a first evening. You are not behind if you skip the rest.
RED, and who to find
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RED stops anything, immediately
RED is the weekend's safe word. Any participant can use it at any time to withdraw consent, and when someone says it the scene stops, either at once or as soon as stopping is safe. You do not need a reason and you do not need to explain afterward.
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Dungeon Masters
are in the play spaces the whole time they are open. They witness consent negotiations if you want one witnessed, they answer questions, and their decisions in the dungeon are final.
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The Dungeon Coordinator
runs the play spaces and is who a Dungeon Master escalates to.
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Any AKW staff member
can take a report. You do not have to find the right person, and you do not have to work out whether something "counts" first. Tell someone at the earliest moment it is safe to do so.
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Ask before you touch anyone, including for a hug
Ask for pronouns if you are not sure. Both of these are normal here and neither is awkward
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Negotiate before you play
Consent means everyone involved is of legal age and has talked about and agreed to what is going to happen before it starts.
The questions people actually ask
Street legal is required, gear is encouraged, and that is the whole rule. In the hotel's public areas (lobby, bar, restaurant, hallways) dress PG: buttocks, breasts, and genitals covered, and a cover-up if the outfit is revealing. Hotel staff consented to see street-legal attire, not more. Keep toys in a bag when you are moving through public areas rather than on your belt. Inside AKW event spaces expectations vary by event and are listed with each one. If you are unsure, whatever you walked in wearing is fine.
No. Watching the whole weekend is a normal way to attend and nobody will ask you to explain it. Where a class offers hands-on practice, the description says so, and taking part is your call in the moment rather than something you agreed to by walking in.
No. Plenty of people wear street clothes all weekend.
Only with explicit consent from everyone in the shot, and you have to tell them where the photos will be used. Consent can be withdrawn at any time. Some spaces are marked No Photography Zones; take a photo in one and you will be asked to delete it, and a second time you may be asked to leave. If you would rather not be photographed at all, step out of frame when others are being photographed. Large crowd shots in gathering spaces may not be avoidable.
Go to check-in and say so. Stepping out of a room you are not enjoying is also completely normal and nobody reads anything into it.
Yes, and it matters more than people expect. Some of this community is strongly affected by scented products. Reduce or drop scented personal care products as much as you can.