Nikki Ebright
A life-long geek, Nikki got the convention bug from various places, including visits to the Renaissance Faire, conferences put on by her parents, and attending StarFests and StarCons in the late 1980s and early 1990s. She has been active with Denver-area conventions since 2008. She is the founder of the Myths and Legends Con (MALCon), and initial chair of HexaCon and WhimsyCon. As a founding member of Shiny Garden, she looked to find others passionate about both creating places for geeks to gather as well as making sure those spaces are welcoming to everyone. She now resides in the Netherlands.
Dustin Hatchett
Dustin has been an avid gamer since he first played TSR’s Boot Hill and FASA’s Star Trek RPG in 1983. In his 25 years in the gaming industry, Dustin has managed multiple retail game stores in Denver, Colorado and owns a production company producing live action role-playing games and multiple game conventions. For the past 20 years, he has worked in technical and project management roles for large telecommunications companies.
Leander Lacy
Leander Lacy is an advocate and active member of the geek community. He attends conventions, plays video games, plays tabletop role-playing games, board games, and has tried LARPing a few times. He is a paid actor for live streaming of tabletop roleplaying games. You can find him as Kaizen in these YouTube videos for Paizo and Pinnacle Entertainment Group’s test play of Pathfinder for Savage Worlds. Leander is dedicated to ensuring that all activities are inclusive and safe for participants. As a Board member of Shiny Gardens, Leander continues to advocate for these values and more.
Billy Van Ark
Shortly after moving to Denver in 2013, Billy began volunteering at conventions in the area. In addition to helping convention chair Nikki Ebright bring the Myths and Legends Convention to life each year from its premier in 2013 through its final year in 2019, he has also been Shiny Garden’s treasurer since its formation in 2016. He now resides in the Netherlands, and continues to provide technical support behind-the-scenes.
Brian Ziman
At university Brian studied Computer Science, Linguistics, and Applied Physics. After working as an adjunct professor of applied information technology at George Mason University and a software engineer at Google, he now serves on the External Advisory Board for the George Mason University Department of Computer Science. He spent many years embracing his love of literature and art through Denver fandom conventions, and he joined Shiny Garden as a founding board member because its mission to create inclusive events resonated with him.