David Brothers is a comics veteran, someone who has seen it all as a critic, writer, and editor. He’s also a long-time resident of California’s Bay Area, so he knows firsthand just how inseparable the comic book medium is from the DNA of the region.

“There’s something special about comics in the Bay Area. We have the long history with underground comics, and I think that’s carried through it to the modern day,” Brothers said. “We know comics are cool, even if they aren’t reading them themselves. So, if you do a comic show, they’ll show up.”

That’s at the heart of why Brothers believes Cape & Cowl Con — a free, one-day comic convention put on by Oakland’s Eisner Award-winning comic shop Cape & Cowl Comics — is such a special and unique show. It doesn’t just represent comics and its creators.

It represents its community.

“It feels like a Bay Area show in a way that I haven’t felt since WonderCon left the Bay and since APE 1 stopped happening,” Brothers shared.

That’s music to the ears of Eitan Manhoff, the owner of Cape & Cowl Comics and the co-curator of the con itself. The focus was on community from the very beginning.

“(Cape & Cowl Con) was just meant to be a celebration of our community and all the aspects that make it up,” Manhoff said. “The fans and readers and customers at the shop, but also the creators that we’ve become friendly with over the years and the people who make cool stuff in our area or that we know from other areas, whatever it may be.

“It was really just, ‘Let’s get everybody in one place and celebrate that together, we are pretty cool.’”

Based on my experience as an attendee and guest 2 of its latest iteration, as well as the feedback of literally every person I talked to, it was mission accomplished for the team behind Cape & Cowl Con. Co-curated by Manhoff and the shop’s marketing manager, Miles Ritchie, with essential assistance by staff member Juliette Capra, August 30th’s fourth edition of Cape & Cowl Con was so exceptional it left my wife Amber Harper — a veteran of comic cons both big and small — astonished by just how wonderful it was.

“It’s one of the most delightful cons I’ve ever attended,” she said.

But what is Cape & Cowl Con, exactly? Well, as noted, it’s a free, one-day comic convention that started in Berkeley, California at Gilman Brewing back in 2023. It quickly outgrew its surroundings. When it moved to Alameda’s Faction Brewing in 2025, it reached another level, as the additional space that location offered gave the convention room for more guests, more vendors, and — beginning with this year’s con — a full day of programming hosted by folks like Brothers and me, amongst others.

2026’s edition was its biggest yet, as it proved to be a celebration of not just the Bay Area but the best and brightest of comics. Its guest list included over 60 creators tabling at Faction Brewing, and its lineup ran the gamut of what the medium has to offer. Starry names like Terry and Rachel Dodson, Pornsak Pichetshote, and Babs Tarr drew crowds, but so did book market gems like Briana Loewinsohn, Thien Pham, and Julia Wertz as well as indie darlings like Dave Baker, Nicole Goux, and Andrew MacLean. It was an astonishing and diverse lineup of guests.

And the people who went clearly agreed. With over 7,500 people in attendance, everyone — and I mean everyone — seemed to have a line of enthusiastic comic buyers and signature seekers throughout. That is, when attendees weren’t luxuriating in the con’s sunny outdoor area as they eagerly read through some of the comics they just acquired.

The fact it was free helped. That ensured comic fans of all ages attended, with families omnipresent throughout. They were thrilled to be there too, with kids gleefully buying comics when they weren’t laughing hysterically at the theatrics of Mac Barnett and Shawn Harris during their performance/panel for their graphic novel series, The First Cat in Space. Add it all up and it resulted in a con that was quite unlike any I’ve ever attended, and for reasons happily touted by its guests.

“I really love that it draws in comic fans but also casual fans and families. People that have never heard of us before will pick up our books. It’s a different feeling than selling to hardcore comic fans that have seen our stuff,” cartoonist Thien Pham said. “It just feels like a big family event.”

“Some conventions have a cold undertone. It’s business,” cartoonist Julia Wertz added. “Obviously, it’s all business, but there’s just a warmth of community at (Cape & Cowl Con).”

“I feel like every single person here is a part of the Bay Area community of comics fans, and everyone was here for comics. That’s a testament to Cape and Cowl and all the other shops where it’s about readers,” artist/writer Tyler Boss shared. “It has a pretty infectious energy from the people who showed up.”

It’s undeniably considered a cool event by guests and attendees alike, but if you ask someone like Eli Harris, an artist who came to the con just to be a part of it, it’s much more than that. Harris believes something like Cape & Cowl Con had been sorely missed by the region.

“It’s filling a need,” Harris said. “After APE and WonderCon, we haven’t had anything like this, and there’s a hunger for it. It feeds this hunger in the Bay Area.”

APE, or Alternative Press Expo, and WonderCon were once two sides of the same coin for the Bay Area. The former was a more indie-centric comic festival while the latter is a more traditional, large scale comic con, and each provided local fans and creators an outlet to revel in the medium in person. But when the former ended in 2017 and the latter moved to Anaheim back in 2011, nothing truly replaced it.

Maybe that’s why Ritchie’s response to a question about why the show exclusively emphasizes comics was, “Because the Bay Area needs it.” There was a vacuum for locals, and Cape & Cowl Con has filled it — and then some.

And that emphasis on building a real comic show for the area has not gone unnoticed by local creators. It’s welcomed by them, and it makes them want to be a part of it.

“Ever since we lost APE and WonderCon, we haven’t really had a Bay Area show,” Pham said. “This really feels like a community-oriented Bay Area show.”

“What’s nice about Cape & Cowl Con is they’re really focusing on the comics,” cartoonist Briana Loewinsohn said. “They’re not losing sight of that, and that’s a great part of it.”

That vision of making a comics show and only that might be why Boss suggested Cape & Cowl Con feels more like a Small Press Expo (or SPX) or Toronto Comic Arts Festival (or TCAF) than a New York Comic Con or C2E2. It keeps a laser focus on the comic book medium and the people who make them. Even better, its view of the world of comics is quite broad, as Loewinsohn noted. Cape & Cowl Con highlights every part of comics in a way most cons struggle to match. That’s special, and something the Bay Area has responded to more and more with each passing year.

According to Annika Jenkins, a local artist, it also offers younger creatives in the area something essential. She went through high school during the pandemic, which meant much of the experience was spent online rather than in person. Because of that, her peers struggled to find community at a crucial time in their lives. She believes experiences like Cape & Cowl Con are helping them find it.

“Getting to see so many people, especially so many people my age, coming out to support the community and have fun and meet each other is powerful,” Jenkins said.

Even though Cape & Cowl Con’s staggering guest list is an obvious hook, one thing that stood out in my conversations with creators and attendees alike was how Cape & Cowl Comics — the shop and the people who work there — was the real draw. So many people didn’t need to know anything more than who was behind it to travel across the Bay Area or even country to turn up at the con or spot up behind one of the many tables they had for guests.

It even helped someone like Richy Sánchez Ayala, a local, overcome the intimidation factor that can come with attending a con. Before Cape & Cowl Con 2025, Ayala had never gone to a convention. He was always nervous about the idea. But knowing his local comic shop Cape & Cowl was behind it was enough for him to make his maiden voyage.

“I came on my own and had a blast,” Ayala said. “I feel very loyal to Cape and Cowl. Anything they do, I’m there.”

That sense of belonging is exactly what Manhoff has been trying to build at the shop, per Capra, although it’s more than that according to the co-lead of this convention.

“It comes back to who Eitan is as a person,” Capra said. “There is a really correct word of mouth that the community that he builds is a real one, and people want to show up for it.”

That’s not just lip service either. When asked about Cape & Cowl’s community, Manhoff accepted all comers. Whether you’re a regular, someone who has visited once, a creator they’ve engaged with in person or over email, or whatever, “you’re part of this community, whether you know it or not.” What that results in, at least according to Ritchie and Capra, is the “single raddest” and “best” community in comics, 3 and it’s one they want to celebrate.

“We want to just keep giving back to them,” Ritchie said. “We just want to throw this big party for them every year.”

They continue to deliver on that promise. What they have managed to build is a singular event crafted by a singular shop and the singular group of people who run it, one that feels completely unlike any other con in the very best of ways. People routinely underlined how relaxed and laid-back Cape & Cowl Con was, with attendees enjoying beer and food as they watched panels or walking through the aisles with their dogs. It had a different vibe than the hustle, bustle, and endless commercialism you’d expect from a comic convention.

“I was so impressed by the balance of commerce and community. It seems like we’ve all done well, but if you walk around, it feels like a neighborhood picnic,” writer Pornsak Pichetshote said. “I’m blown away by that.”

The only problem is this neighborhood picnic is getting pretty big. The word is out on Cape & Cowl Con, and each passing iteration draws greater crowds than the last, something that even surprises the team behind it.

“When the idea first came up, I don’t think any of us thought it was going to be anything like this,” Capra said. “It’s much bigger than we thought it was going to be, but clearly, people needed it.”

You could feel it from almost the opening minutes of the event. Faction Brewing is a perfect home for the vibes of the con, but at its peak, this year’s iteration almost maxed out its venue. The density of attendees rivaled the biggest comic conventions at times. 4 That doesn’t mean it can’t reside there. It’s a fitting location, and one that has quickly become tied to how word of mouth is spreading amongst creators. In particular, artist Terry Dodson is a fan of Faction Brewing as its home. Every time I talked to him before and during the con, he couldn’t help but tout its location.

But the team behind it knows change will eventually come for Cape & Cowl Con — and they welcome it.

“Whether it’s in the form of an outdoor festival or another brewery or something, it’s going to keep evolving and changing shape,” Ritchie said.

It’ll continue to evolve, but Manhoff says some things will always stay the same. Even if they eventually bring more guests and attendees — which he said is a goal — Manhoff “still want(s) it to be curated.” He doesn’t want it “to be a con where if you sign up and give us $400, you’re in and I don’t care what you’re doing.” There will be “no AI prints or Funko Pops,” and he never wants to hold it at a traditional space like a convention center.

That’s just not an option in his mind.

“If the only way to keep getting bigger is to go into a convention center, then we’ll just stay this size,” Manhoff said.

Crucially, Manhoff said the show will never leave the East Bay. While they’ve moved from Berkeley to Alameda and would love to make their way into Oakland eventually, the event’s co-curator said it will never take place in San Francisco or San Jose or other parts of the Bay. Community is something Manhoff takes a lot of pride in, and he wants to represent the part of the Bay Area that’s always shown up for his store.

And there’s little doubt that they’ll show up for Cape & Cowl Con regardless. No matter where it goes in the East Bay, no matter how big its venue proves to be, it feels like an event that has become a staple for the Bay Area, one that represents the heart and history of its community — and will only continue to flourish because of it.

“If you give people the space to grow into a place, they’ll grow into it,” Brothers said about the con. “It’s nice to have a place to belong.”

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