9th July 2026
We got Angel Giuffria on a call recently, mostly to check in, and the conversation kept circling back to one thing: Lucky Fin Project Weekend, happening July 10-12 in Troy, Michigan. Angel’s first year was 2016, which makes this her 10 year anniversary with the event, and it’s clear it still means as much to her now as it did back then.
Ask Angel what actually happens at Lucky Fin and she doesn’t describe a rigid schedule, but the weekend does have a rhythm. It kicks off with an informal meet-up on Friday night, followed by yoga Saturday morning. Then comes the picnic in the park, with vendors and nearly 1,000 people filling the space. The day winds down with a reception back at the hotel, where the evening includes two performances from limb different musicians, Jack Thomas from Canada’s Got Talent, and Lee Cleaveland and the Left Hand Band, whose song “Cyborg Man” is a hit with the kids.
For Angel, the appeal is simple: it’s a place where people can just be themselves. For a community that spends most of its time navigating a two-handed world, that shift is bigger than it sounds.
The event has grown a lot. Registrations are already over 900 this year, and there’s always some stragglers who forget to register but show up anyway. The hotel itself is an atrium-style setup, the kind of place where people naturally end up gathered in shared spaces all weekend.
The event isn’t just for the upper limb community either. Angel mentioned her friend Sam, a Lucky Fin Project Ambassador and lower limb amputee whose own first year was last year. This time around, Sam is bringing her husband to Lucky Fin for the first time.
A lot of Angel’s weekend goes to talking with parents and kids, showing off her different devices and answering the questions people are often too nervous to ask anywhere else, drawing on her own experience of wearing prosthetics since she was 6 weeks old. Those conversations matter more than you’d think. She’s watched parents go from anxious to genuinely relieved after one talk, realizing their kid’s future is going to be fine, more than fine, actually.
There’s a quieter thing happening among the kids too. Siblings of children with limb differences tend to grow up with a lot of empathy, and when kids meet other kids who look like them, it just registers as normal, a feeling that can take a back seat when they’re navigating new situations with different people.
Angel at Lucky Fin back in 2016, her first year attending. Photo courtesy of Angel Giuffria.
Angel is quick to point out that this entire community exists because of one person: Molly, the founder who started the Lucky Fin Project and built it essentially from nothing. It was really her daughter Ryan, born with a limb difference, whose existence was the catalyst for Molly creating all of this in the first place. What started small is now one of the largest support communities for limb differences anywhere in the world, connecting people with both upper and lower limb differences in a space with genuinely no agenda attached.
We never miss it, it’s the highlight of our events calendar. This year our team will include an upper limb specialist from Chicago, along with our ambassador Tilly Lockey. If your kids want freebies, or just want to check out the latest in bionic tech, come find us at our stand.
A young attendee checking out one of our devices at a past Lucky Fin Project Weekend.
Kids choosing their favorite bionic arm designs at Lucky Fin Project Weekend.
If you’re in Troy, Michigan July 10-12, keep an eye out. Angel will be there, same as every year, for the same reason everyone else keeps coming back.
You can still pop into your local Open Bionics clinic to demo any of our tech. Register to request more information.
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