Your Guide to the World of Furry Fandom
Ed Swanson and his wife Nitha Swanson are crafters from Southern California who specialize in making various cloth items for sale at street fairs and conventions. Items including: Life-sized dachshunds and not-life-sized dragons (well, unless your dragons are very small!) in various colors. Including some rather psychedelic-colored leopard prints. Head on over to their web site and see what else The Dragon Flame Shop has to offer.
image c. 2015 The Dragon Flame Shop
Designer USB sticks have been a thing for a while now. So why bring up “Mimobots” here, now? Well maybe because their designs happen to include My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Ugly Doll, Hello Kitty, Adventure Time, and more! Mimoco also has a line of designer “Mimo Power Tubes”: Single-cell rechargeable back-up batteries for cell-phones, hand-held games, and so forth. New designs are coming out all the time, so keep your eyes on the Mimoco web site.
image c. 2015 Mimoco.com
How could you not notice a web site with a name like bekyoot.com? And it’s newly redesigned to boot. “BeKyoot is inspired by life, laughter, and the pursuit of cuteness. There is a story behind every character – a life of whimsy and simplicity sure to set a smile on your face. Many of the characters are based off of real life animals and experiences. The first BeKyoot artbook and webcomic compilation are currently in production along with the first of many children’s books.” Right now though there’s a collection of t-shirts and other clothes, plushy critters, art prints, and other products available.
image c. 2015 bekyoot.com
What if Pokemon were not cute little fighting monsters but giant, city-stomping kaiju monsters? That’s the idea that inspired freelance artist Mike Vasquez to create Popzilla, a new collection of monster-themed art. That’s where it started anyway, but then it expanded to include any number of well-known pop-culture icons re-imagined as kaiju. Over at Kickstarter the art book has already been successfully funded, but go anyway to find out more about the project. Or, you could just visit Mike’s web site (entitled Mike Goes Geek, perhaps appropriately) and follow his blog. Several sketches are there too.
image c. 2015 by Mike Vasquez
Janet Lee describes herself like this: “I am an artist, award-winning illustrator, and cat-tamer who may or may not have been raised by gypsies in the Black Forrest…” She is also, if her illustration is any proof, someone who is trying to bring a lot of “funny” back to “funny animals”. See her print below? That’s Ron Weasely. Get it? [And yes, she has a new print of Harry Otter too…] Take a look at her web site to see what else she’s been up to (when her cats will give her time). And don’t forget to look at her Etsy Shop too.
image c. 2015 by Janet Lee
It’s time we checked in again with the artist Chet Phillips. Known for his fanciful anthro-primates (he even did a whole collector-card game based on evil monkeys!), now cats and even kaiju are turning up more and more in his works. (Kaiju are giant monsters stomping all over Japan, in case you forgot!) Recently he created a collectible card set based on kaiju baseball players, as well as the usual prints and other artistic stuff. Go visit his Etsy store to see what we’re talking about, and hopefully this will all make a lot more sense!
image c. 2015 by Chet Phillips
Ed Roeder and Ruth Castillo-Roeder are two artists living in Southern California who happen to be married. They sell their works together at a web site called Castle By Design. He works mostly in paintings, she works mostly in photography. Most likely his works are going to be the ones that furry fans will take note of — as you can see by the t-shirt design below! He also has a collection of illustrated postcards and even i-phone cases for sale.
image c. 2015 by Ed Roeder
The Awkward Animal web site is home to a series of plush toy animals who are put together… slightly wrong. They tend to suffer for it — in the cutest ways possible. Now in addition to their line of plushies, t-shirts, and other accessories, the Awkward Animal creators have a series of short animated commercials up on their web site to introduce you to these clumsy creatures. Go say hello to the latest, Awkward Fox! He made his premier at this year’s San Diego Comic Con.
image c. 2015 AwkwardAnimal.com
Ursa Major Award winner Rukis recently announced a new set of books coming out from FurPlanet. Following the award-winning novel Off the Beaten Path and its sequel, Lost on Dark Trails, the third book in the trilogy comes out this July. In The Long Road Home, “Shivah’s journey continues, taking her not only across a country she never truly knew, but soon the oceans, as well. She finds herself journeying to a distant land, but even so far from home, she can’t hide from her grief, or the anger eating away at her heart.” Also this July comes a collection of full-color mature-themed art that Rukis and Myenia created for their popular Menagerie series. Check out over at FurPlanet’s web site to find out more.
image c. 2015 by Rukis
