Biscuit — Vinyl-Toy Cartoon Cat, Bakery Forecourt, Seoul

Sung in Seongsu-dong is a bakery the size of a large cupboard, and it sells out by eleven in the morning. The owner wanted a cat outside that would do the job of a sign without being a sign.

The brief

A fat cat, seated, about 1.9 m, in a colour that would not clash with the shop. One condition, delivered as a warning rather than a request: it must not look like a mascot costume. Bakers are sensitive about their trade looking cheap.

Choosing the vinyl-toy language

We proposed building it as an inflated toy: balloon volumes, fat rounded seams at every join, and a surface with the dense even shine of a vinyl figure rather than the wet shine of lacquer. The seams are the important part. They are what tells your eye the object was moulded rather than grown, and they are why the piece reads as a designed product instead of a large ornament.

The body is essentially three spheres. The head is one, larger than the other two combined. Everything else — ears, tail, paws, muzzle — is an appendage that was made as small as it could be without disappearing.

Moulding a seam that looks intentional

Real seams in a vinyl toy are tool marks from the mould halves. Ours had to be modelled. Each seam is a narrow raised ridge about 6 mm wide, placed on the actual geometry of the model rather than painted on, so it catches light along its whole length. The ridge had to be sanded to an even height across the whole piece or the shine breaks and the illusion goes with it.

Colour and the shopfront

We settled on a warm caramel with cream and a single raspberry accent inside the ears, drawn from the bakery’s own packaging. The owner had wanted pink; this is the compromise and it was the right one, because caramel in a glossy finish reads as baked goods and pink would have read as candy.

Season one

Seoul winters are hard on painted outdoor work and the owner now covers it at night. The coat has held. So has the queue, which is now longer than the shop.