Licensing Works! Announces Kewpie x ONCH Collaboration

Brandora Editorial Staff - October 2022

Licensing Works!® announced immediate availability of the Kewpie® x ONCH collaboration featuring skin tone inclusive Kewpie characters for the first time on jewelry and skateboards designed by ONCH.

Kewpie-cute enamel earrings, pins, necklaces, and skateboard decks allow Kewpie fans to celebrate their uniqueness and individuality. As part of the design, Kewpie is seen holding ONCH’s signature double-twist pretzel, which represents a heart with DNA (double helix), something we all share no matter what skin we’re in.

The collection first appeared Friday on mobile-first video shopping platform NTWRK, known for offering fans highly coveted collectibles and unique collaborations from the world’s hottest brands. The product is now also available on www.onch.us.

“This collection was designed to embrace inclusivity and celebrate our individuality,” said ONCH. He continued, “It is such an honor to team up with a company that shares my same beliefs allowing me to use my art to help continue the legacy of Rose O’Neill and her iconic Kewpie characters.”

“Working with ONCH is a dream opportunity,” said Leslie Levine, Owner at Licensing Works!®. “His creativity is amazing and the talent he collaborated with on this project really delivered the important messaging that would have made Kewpie-creator, Rose O’Neill, proud”, continued Levine.

Comedian Atsuko Okatsuka is adorned in Kewpie accessories for the October 16th issue cover of Contrast Magazine. Atsuko, recently named “10 Comics to Watch for 2022” by Variety, will be featured in her first solo HBO Special airing in December. For the inclusive marketing campaign, ONCH invited nine celebrity friends to be featured which along with Atsuko and her husband Ryan Harper Gray, including Courtney Revolution from Netflix’ “The Circle”, Kent Boyd from Fox’ “So You Think You Can Dance”, Alessandra Torresani from “The Big Bang Theory”, with her real life Kewpie Doll, Lady as well as actor, Daniel Nguyen, music artist, Saika, influencer/podcaster, Rory Uphold, actresses and sisters, Josetty and Gennesis Hurtado and celebrity fitness trainer, Nicole Steen. Makeup for the campaign shoot was generously supplied by Lady Gaga’s makeup company, Haus Labs.

Kewpie, one of the world’s first global licensing sensations, was created more than a century ago by artist and writer, Rose O’Neill, later labeled as “America’s First Female Cartoonist”. A prolific illustrator, Smithsonian Magazine wrote that O’Neill “revolutionized the intertwining of marketing and political activism”, referring to her fight for women’s right to vote, support of racial equality and advocacy for the poor. Originally launched as a comic published in1909 in Ladies’ Home Journal, O’Neill’s Kewpie illustrations and stories featured these “little cupids” doing good deeds in funny and unexpected ways. Rose O’Neill described a Kewpie as “…always searching for ways to make the world a better and a funnier place.” O’Neill’s tiny-winged, wide-eyed, round-bellied Kewpies – with their distinctive facial expressions and their message encouraging merriment, love and kindness – were an instant hit with both kids and adults. Little did Rose know that more than a century later, Rolling Stone Magazine would write about Kewpie helping to define “pop culture cuteness”.