South Florida’s furry community is finally getting a convention of its own, and it’s arriving just in time for Halloween.
Destination PAWadise 2026 makes its debut on Friday, October 30, at the Church of Perpetual Life Campus in Pompano Beach, Florida, with a one-day furry festival called Phantoms of the Glades.
The event is the result of a collaboration between PawadiseFurs of Northern Broward County and West Palm Furs, two groups working to establish a permanent furry convention in Southeast Florida.
And they’ve got some pretty entertaining plans for their first gathering.
Attendees can expect artists, vendors, panels, music, dancing, gaming, and performances, along with a Halloween-inspired theme involving mysterious experiments and escaped creatures in the Florida Everglades.
Scheduled activities include furry meetups, figure drawing, a sketchbook swap, animation demonstrations, and even a sea shanty sing-along.
But there’s a bigger purpose behind Destination PAWadise. Organizers hope this inaugural mini-convention will help raise the funds needed to establish a larger, hotel-based convention by 2028.
Destination PAWadise takes place Friday, October 30, 2026, at 950 S. Cypress Road, Pompano Beach, Florida 33060. The event is intended for attendees ages 18 and older, with registration required.
For South Florida’s furry, therian, and otherkin communities, this Halloween gathering could be the beginning of something much bigger.
And with a name like Phantoms of the Glades, it’s already off to a suitably spooky start.
Beam Me Up Scotty
Old punk rocker from Miami who still smells faintly like comic shops and poor financial decisions.
