Meet The Winners Of The 2018 Star Trek Las Vegas Costume Contest + More STLV Cosplay

One of our final articles for our coverage of Star Trek Las Vegas focuses on who it is all about, the fans, and specifically the cosplaying fans. We have details on the annual costume contest, including talking with some of the winners. In addition to photos from the contest, we have also curated some of the great cosplay seen around STLV all weekend.

Disco and DS9 highlighted at costume contest

Dozens of talented cosplayers entered the annual costume contest. This year there were two special categories to commemorate the first season of Star Trek: Discovery and the 25th anniversary of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Cosplayers lined up for the costume contest, along with some Star Trek celebrity judges (Photo: Eriel Nash)

Clint Wilder won Best in Show when he stunned the audience with his Firewolf (aka Mirror Voq) costume from Star Trek: Discovery. He was inspired long before STLV, “I really enjoy the new Star Trek Discovery and I thought it was a perfect opportunity to get cracking on it before the convention…I dove in, I spent about six weeks, got it made, here we are!” Wilder’s wife Amy also entered the contest as Captain Killy. Clint noted, “The family that cosplays together stays together.”

2018 costume contest winner Clint Wilder (Photo: Rich Miles)

Mahogany Harris won the Discovery special category in her Mirror Universe Michael Burnham costume, “…the overall thing took me three months to make. The chest plate and shoulder pieces and my knife were all made of worbla with foam underneath.” One of the hallmarks of her costume was the accouterments and props, “The belts and holster were made out of vinyl with craft foam on top for texture as well and that was all acrylic paint with a sealer applied over top.”

Mahogany Harris captured third place as Michael Burnham in Terran uniform costume  (Photo: Rich Miles)

Bill Arucan and Jennifer Rough won the Deep Space Nine special category as Tosk and Hunter from the episode “Captive Pursuit.” Jennifer’s husband Michael helped in the construction and shared why they chose this unique costume, “We really liked the episode…we haven’t seen any Hunter-Tosk combinations in the con and we’ve been going for ten years now.”  When we asked Jennifer about the comfort of the costume she replied with a laugh, “It’s hot!  There’s not a lot of airflow, but it’s always fun to be a different character.”

Bill Arucan and Jennifer Rough as DS9’s Tosk and Hunter (Photo: Rich Miles)

Veteran cosplayer Chad Buffett won Best in Captain Class as Kol from Star Trek: Discovery. Chad recalled that during STLV 2017 someone remarked that the Klingons of Star Trek: Discovery would be too hard to cosplay and thus cosplayers would dislike the new design. Chad saw this as an opportunity to take on a challenge as well as diversify his costume collection, “I took that personally as a challenge to actually create the costume plus it was time for a new costume.”

Chad Buffett came in second as Kol (Photo: Rich Miles)

Anthony Polito from California amazed the judges with his Tholian costume. winning Best in Lieutenant Class. The construction took about a year and involved styrofoam, joint hinges, and LED lighting.

Anthony Polito came in third with this Tholian costume (Photo: Michael Nguyen)

Rounding out the winners for 2018 was Jason Winningham who won Best in Ensign Class with his creative Discovery costume of a Tardigrade and trainer.

Jason Winningham (right) with other costume contest winners (Photo: Rich Miles)

If there’s one thing people can count on it’s the commitment, creativity, and passion of the fans who compete in the annual STLV costume contest!

Winners of the 2018 Star Trek Las Vegas Costume Contest (Photo: Eriel Nash)

More STLV 2018 Cosplay

The costume contest is just part of the overall cosplay from Star Trek Las Vegas. Fans come every day in costume, some with multiple costumes over the weekend. We saw a lot of creative outfits over the weekend. Below are some organized group shots along with more of our favorites.

Discovery cosplayers group (Photo: Christine Rideout)

Deep Space Nine group (Photo: Christine Rideout)

Mirror Universe group (Photo: Christine Rideout)

Disco shirt group (Photo: Christine Rideout)

More Star Trek cosplay

Mashups and other franchises

More STLV

We have a couple more interviews from STLV coming up, so stay tuned.  Click here to see all of our STLV coverage to date.