The Cats That Nearly Never Happened
This week saw the launch of the brand new Cat Companions here at Jin Designs!
If you've followed me for a while, you might have been wondering why it's taken so long for some new cats to arrive. To be honest, I've been trying to design them since around 2018.
You might know already that there's a beautiful range of cats in the form of Sitting Cat, Sleeping Cat, Standing Cat, Crouching Cat. I love these designs and they're very close to my heart, inspired by a cat I had when growing up. And I think that was part of the problem. It became hard to build on this collection.
Every time I sat down to design more, it didn't come naturally. I'd sketch a few ideas, try different positions, tweak and move things around. But it just wasn't happening. I felt the pressure that anything I did wasn't going to be as good as what I'd already done. So it became easier to do anything but designing.
At the beginning of this year I didn't really know what to do or which direction to go. I was afraid to design anything and after a manic Christmas period and feeling burnt out, I was close to just throwing the towel in. I couldn't see a way forward.
One thing that helped was going to see a business coach. We talked about products, collections and ideas. Then she said to me, "just do half an hour". That was all. Just half an hour of designing. Then come back in two weeks.
Looking back on this, it wasn't really about the half hour. It was having the accountability.
It's so easy when you work on your own to just fill your time with firefighting a business. It's so reactive. There's usually always an email to answer, a website change to make, a product to upload, an order to sort out. And the weeks go by and you still haven't designed anything.
It's also the easiest thing to avoid as it's actually quite scary creating new designs. It's exciting but it's also quite nerve-racking, especially when you've already got a collection that people love. I kept thinking, "I'm not sure I can do better than what I've already done, what if they don't like the new stuff", so it was easy, with this in my mind, just to find something else to do.
Eventually though, I sat down and started. And you know what it's like, once you start, things start to take shape. Literally. The breakthrough came when I stopped trying to create more versions of the original cats. And I started to think about what it is that I actually love about living with cats. And living with a cat, you get the joy of watching them every day. All those little moments.
These moments, like waiting by the door for you to come home. Loafing in a sunny spot on the floor. Watching something random out the window. Sleeping beside you, twitching every now and then, dreaming away.
When you live with a cat, these wonderful simple moments become part of everyday life. They're ordinary to our cats, but to us they're the reason we love them so much.
And slowly the new collection began. Sometimes starting is the hardest part but once I got going, it flowed so naturally. One cat became two. Then three. Then I had four! The simplest designs you'll probably ever find. Capturing those everyday poses with a simple black outline, soft-edged shapes and plenty of space.
The Cat Companions became Waiting Cat, Watching Cat, Loafing Cat and Dreaming Cat.
Not based on one particular cat. Not even based on my cat Pebbles, although living with her certainly helped! They're really about all our cats. Your cat. My cat. The cat you grew up with. The cat currently stretched out across the sofa taking up all the room so that you can't put your feet up!
I hope you love them as much as I've loved creating them.
Jinny
Designer / Founder of Jin Designs
