Photos from Lebowski Fest 2011

Looking to find your way to Lebowski Fest? Just follow the dudes in the bathrobes. Or the men holding coffee cans. Or the women in the Viking horns.

Last night was part one of a two-part yearly Dude celebration, held in New York’s Chelsea Piers, with the festivities culminating tonight with a cast reunion of the Coen Brothers’$2 1998 cult classic, The Big Lebowski. When the movie was released 13 years ago, on March 6, 1998, it received decent-to-good reviews and barely made its budget back here in the States (cost $15 million; earned $17 million domestically). But a small, vocal audience was growing, learning and quoting every line of the film (personal favorite: “Obviously you’re not a golfer”), and in 2002, a group of 150 fans met in Louisville, KY for the first Lebowski Fest, led by founders Will Russell and Scott Shuffitt.

Last night at the Pier, there was bowling, trivia (sample first round question: “Who is Bunny’s neighbor in the beaver picture?”), a costume contest, White Russians, and a midnight release of The Big Lebowski on Blu-Ray. Elsewhere, in Greece, Tara Reid got married.

After the jump are photos from last night’s Lebowski Fest.

Nadia Chaudhury took these photos, and she’d love for you to visit her bunny-loving Twitter

Photos from Lebowski Fest 2011