Well, <i> Hello</i> Kitty: Julius the Monkey Meets His Match
Hello Kitty spotted Julius the Monkey first. She liked his style, the way he frolicked on the chests of the young and hip. He was a little young (a mere 5 or 6 ... ), she thought. But she liked the way he made people smile. She got some friends to set her up.
There have been some rough patches, as there are at the start of any new relationship, and there have been compromises, about the proper role of cat, and monkey. But with a team of professionals standing by, things have worked out. The two will appear in public for the first time in the spring.
In an interspecies fashion deal targeting connoisseurs of cute, Sanrio’s fashionable feline is hooking up with Paul Frank’s snazzy simian to launch a special collection of limited-edition accessory items.
“Paul Frank’s Hello Kitty Collection” is slated to appear in stores in the spring. The collection will include shoulder bags, CD wallets, a coin purse and T-shirts, with Hello Kitty and Julius the Monkey kickin’ it around town. The collection will cost between $25 and $75. Final designs are still being hashed out. But a preseason peek at the pop-icons at play shows cat and monkey flirting and having a hoot. (“It’s a platonic relationship. They are just friends,” stresses Laura Takaragawa, license marketing and sales manager for Sanrio.)
In one drawing, Julius--the Italian stallion--rides round town on a motorbike, Hello Kitty clinging girlishly to his waist. In another Hello Kitty and Julius are couple-skating, legs thrust out behind them like little Olympians. A T-shirt shows a manly Julius-as-James Dean working on the engine of his pink vintage car--with custom flaming on the side--and Hello Kitty sticking her head out the window.
Hello Kitty is the 26-year-old flagship character of Sanrio, the Japanese gift and accessory company. Its president and CEO, Shintaro Tsuji, founded the company in 1960 based on the concept that a small gift can bring a big smile to a child. Sanrio has created hundreds of other characters over the years, including Badtz-Maru, a penguin with attitude, and Pochacco, a sports-minded pup with a weakness for ice cream, but none with the appeal of the kitten. The company has opened 120 Sanrio boutiques in the U.S., including shops at the Beverly Center, South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa and Horton Plaza in San Diego. Sanrio wares, which include just about every logo-friendly object under the sun ranging from vacuum cleaners to steering wheel covers, are also available in toy stores and at national chains. Last year, the company’s sales exceeded $1.2 billion.
Paul Frank, 33, started making wallets and bags for his friends in his Huntington Beach bedroom in the early ‘90s, and established Paul Frank Industries in Costa Mesa in 1995. Sales topped $10 million last year. His home products, clothing and accessories, which feature Julius, Clancy the giraffe and Ellie the elephant, are sold in specialty stores and in his San Francisco and Newport Beach boutiques. In September, a Paul Frank store is scheduled to open in L.A., and stores in Osaka and London should be open by year’s end.
Sanrio executives, who initiated the deal, say Frank’s hip designs suit the Sanrio aesthetic. The agreement, they say, is part of an effort to make Hello Kitty appealing to the girl-women of today, who crave little-girl fun and can pay big-woman prices. The co-branding agreement is a first for Hello Kitty, who, at this stage of her life, is looking for something new. Sanrio once worked with Japanese designer Kansai Yamamoto. But Hello Kitty has neve r teamed up with another character--let alone a monkey. “Paul Frank is known for his high quality, and a high price tag to go along with it,” Takaragawa said. A Paul Frank T-shirt, for instance, might cost $22.
Frank said he was humbled and elated when he got the matchmaking call from Sanrio.
“I just think it’s a huge honor, and I’m really proud of it. This guy who used to make wallets in his bedroom gets to have a character he drew on the same purse as Hello Kitty. That is pretty big. That is something I can die happy knowing. For them to recognize me is like, ‘Whoa.”’
Julius, a lovable cartoon primate with a wide, red mouth, was inspired by the sock monkey his grandmother made for him as a child.
His first heavy exposure to the playful puss came in his 20s, when his then-girlfriend used to drag him to a Sanrio store at South Coast Plaza every week. Hello Kitty was one reason he started drawing in the first place. “Men don’t usually go to Sanrio by themselves, you know what I mean?” Frank said. His girlfriend, he said, “helped me nurture my inner boy ... my inner girl. I was always going shopping with her, looking at bags and clothes. That made me come home and draw.”
The co-branding effort has spawned some Darwinian struggles between cat and monkey.
“That’s a touchy subject,” Frank says of the collaborative design process between himself and Sanrio’s creative designer, Yuko Yamaguchi in Tokyo. “They would say, ‘Kitty wouldn’t do that.’ And I would say, ‘Well, Julius wouldn’t do that.”’ Neither company would elaborate.
Except to say that in the original tennis scene Kitty was acing Julius, which did not go over well with Frank, Takaragawa said. The scene now shows the tennis ball in the foreground, with neither character clearly dominating.
Among L.A. hipsters in the target age-group, news of the agreement evoked mixed, but strong, reactions. “I could see that,” said Clara Moore, 30, of the cat and monkey merger, as she munched on sushi in Venice. “It would give Paul Frank a more mainstream audience and make Hello Kitty more cutting edge.”
“I was repulsed,” said her dinner companion, Winnie Flach, 28, who wore a sleeveless shirt with Julius emblazoned on it. In her opinion, Frank is selling out to a mainstream Japanese company.
Opinions were similarly divided at the Westside Pavilion.
“That sounds cute. I’d buy it,” said Cristina Mura, 32, a fan of both.
“When I think Paul Frank, I think Barney’s, I think upscale cartoon caricature,” said Michelle Waterbury, 28, of Toluca Lake, who said Julius reminds her of her boyfriend, and as a result she has spent large sums on a tiny Julius towel ($29, now framed) and a Julius address book ($68, on sale). Hello Kitty, she said, is for little kids and Japanese tourists. “I just don’t see it. I don’t think they should mix. I will buy Julius by himself.”
