It's officially published. GUND is making Squaredy Cats

We got our first alert since the press release went out. Gift Shop Magazine has published the news on their website. GUND is making Squaredy Cats plush :)
We couldn't be more excited! It's real ;)

Here's the link.

The first series will be nine Squaredy Cats. Below is an image of 4 samples of the plush Squaredy Cats in the first series GUND is making.

Squaredy Cats mention

License Global mentioned our recent licensing deals for Squaredy Cats in their online daily news :)

The NEW new studio

It's been a while since we've posted regularly, but that's probably a good sign because we are so busy or because SO MUCH is a SECRET! There's so much "mum" is the word on so much of what we're doing. We've been hoping to make some big announcements recently, but there seems to be a lot of hurry up and wait in the world of licensing.

Because we've been so sporadic in posting to the blog, I'm pretty sure we never got around to posting much about our new studio…that we moved into…in January, 2009 :P   -   and of course, we have since left that studio, and moved into a new studio after that…in October, 2009. It's now April, 2010, and I'm getting around to posting pix of our brand new empty studio. We've filled it with all our stuff since then, and maybe by the time we move out of this one we'll find the time to post those pix ;)

Here's what our studio on 2nd Avenue in Brooklyn looked like a few days before we moved in:

That's our Mini Cooper. Our studio is the fifth window in (without the AC).

The front door of Studio 35 looking into the hallway.

The building our studio used to be a textile factory, and is in is under the F,N,R trains.

By the way, this blog now feeds directly into our Facebook page. Fan us there for other updates, and you can follow us more closely as we monkey around.

Sketchatoy Interview

We were interviewed on the Sketchatoy blog. Check it out here

Toy Fair 2010

As usual, we've been so busy, I haven't had a chance to comment on the recent Toy Fair. We have to be careful about what we say since everything there is pretty much somebody's top secret. If we were "press" I'm sure we would be allowed to divulge some of the secrets we saw, but since we share a place in the industry as toy designers and licensors we must respect the wishes of who we talked to about what we witnessed.

This may have been our most important Toy Fair yet because we are working on designing Squaredy Cats with [undisclosed plush company], and we had a meeting with our agents and [undisclosed plush company] to view the most recent samples they've made. We were thrilled with how they look, and we can't wait to show you images of the actual products once they're made. We should have plush Squaredy Cats in stores this October along with some other fun items.

It's also always exciting to see products we had a hand in designing that show up at Toy Fair or in the stores. Typically it can take up to two years to see a final product on something we designed or helped design. Usually, by the time something shows up in public we hold back on announcing it because we feel we've grown so much artistically since the initial work was done. That might just be normal artist self-doubt.

One client that we work with was willing to allow us to photograph their booth. INI, Inc produces the game, I've Never… along with a few other titles and merchandise based on the I've Never brand. We've done quite a bit of work for them. Check out their games, and if you buy one of their items, tell'em we sent ya.

The INI Toy Fair booth with some of their titles, the I've Never…Game,

I've Never…Beer Pong, I've Never…Party Dice, the I've Never…Game for Kids.

Brainstorm Session

Brainstorming is an important part of a toy designer/inventor's day. This is what a brainstorming session looks like at Monkey Doodle Dandy Studio!

Paperoni Deluxe Studio has a commercial

See THE COMMERCIAL here

The Paperoni Deluxe Studio is available on Amazon now :)

Spin Master's Paperoni Deluxe Studio is available on Amazon.
Elaine designed some of the Paperoni animals for this and other sets. She did preliminary concept sketches, and worked out 3-D mock-ups for most of these Paperoni characters.
Visit the official paperoni site :)

Squaredy Cats style guide covers

This post is a bit late, but I saved the link to archive here.

These are pictures Karen posted of the Squaredy Cats style guide covers she did for us.

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not squared to blog it

 From the Squaredy Cats™ blog.

 From the Squaredy Cats™ Facebook page. 

We finally started a blog and a Facebook fan page for the Squaredy Cats. There's tons of content to be added, so watch for it. The news for Squaredy Cats should be picking up too, so watch for that to increase as well.

We'll be posting cats on the blog along with anecdotes about what we were thinking when they were individually designed.

Check out the Squaredy Cats Blog

Check out the Squaredy Cats Facebook fan page

We'll keep the fan feed in the sidebar to the right as well.

Please design (X) for free

As illustrators and designers, we've all bee through this. Simply put: Potential doesn't pay my mortgage.

But for a more colorful version of this scenario (which comes up all too often for those of us who wield a pencil and mouse for a living), please to enjoy:

An amusing correspondence from 27b/6™ regarding designing for the possibility of payment.

:P