These minicards (printed at moo.com) are the seeds of my new upcoming licensing collection – a dozen jungle animals presented on bold color backgrounds. They make great impact on cards, stationary and tableware. Below is my business card dispenser, a clown espresso cup that I designed for Ritzenhoff. In the background you can see that «Bad Design Kills» zombie created by Velvet Moustache.
I discovered these intriguing and original creatures at the Souk Christmas show in Montreal last December. Made of exotic woods, they charmed me immediately and I knew I had to have them for my art toy collection. Plus I had some leftover birthday money to spend! Alexandre Lafleur, a former cartoonist, explained his concept: «They are ambiguous – they are forest sprites, animals, robots, whatever you want them to be. Wood is a living and incomparable medium. The infinite variety of textures, colors and patterns give a unique personality to each of my toys, even if they are produced in series.» Inspiration? «I love traditional Japanese art, comics by Tezuka (considered the father of the modern manga), sculptures by Henry Moore and Niki de Saint Phale, toys by Australian Nathan Jurevicius (of Scarytoy fame), classical Indian music, a hot cup of tea…»
Interested in getting a sprite for yourself? «I’ll be opening an Etsy shop soon but, in the meantime, you can e-mail me at kijemanito@yahoo.ca» Thanks, Alexandre, I have my «monkey» and my «caterpillar» right up there next to my Japanese wooden dolls!
My «Lovebutton» cards and stickers that I ordered from moo.com are here and ready for distribution. The minicards are very versatile – I use them as business cards, as gift tags, as bookmarks or simply as portfolio samples. The jellybeans were delicious too. White ones were coconut flavored, the red ones, sour apples and the pink ones tasted, well, pink (bubblegum or rootbeer or…).
And here you can see how the stickers turned out.
My new collection of Valentine designs is now available on moo.com. These 14 cute designs are inspired by contemporary handmade plush toys. I would recommend the stickerbooks as gifts, the mincards (which are really tiny) as love notes that you can strew about the house and the notecards (that have a sturdy folding flap) to display on your shelf. I’ll show them to you as soon as I receive my order!