The Cosplay Club hosted its second annual Maid Café, bringing Japanese culture to the Kent Student Center’s Schwebel Room on March 28. 

A maid café is a specialty café that is popular in Japan. It centers around waiters dressing in maid costumes and providing interactive entertainment to customers. Maids may cast spells on food to make it taste better, chat with customers in character or do live performances.

Grace Ellis, the cosplay club president, was inspired to host a maid café in Ohio after doing a deep dive on the topic. 

“That’s our hope — to bring a little maid café here because there’s not a lot of places where you can visit one, unless you go to Japan or to a convention. And usually they’re near California,” Ellis said. 

When entering the room, people were met with a resounding “Welcome home, master!” by the staff, and received a ticket to be seated. 

After receiving a ticket, one of the 13 maids on staff guided visitors to a table where they could pick from a free menu consisting of treats and beverages. Some of which included yellow cake, cookies, brownies and lemonade. 

Each maid has an anonymous identity with a unique name and character they play. Before entering, visitors are warned to not take photos of maids without their consent, to touch them or to ask for personal information. 

Around every 30 minutes, maids would also appear at the front of the room to perform a live choreographed dance routine. During the performances, the rest of the maids appeared in the audience with light sticks where they cheered them on. 

Other activities include getting the chance to play games with the maids, chatting with them, free food and receiving a commemorative photo called a “checkie,” a polaroid photo decorated by the maids. 

Around 100 people appeared at the first event, and a little more than that were expected at the second year’s event. 

Ellis also hopes that the event will continue to go on for many more years to come.

Sascha Aleksich is reporter. Contact her at [email protected].