Who created Hello Kitty and can we be best friends?

Hello Kitty has been around since 1974, and her popularity has only increased over the years. Sanrio, the merchandising company that owns the Hello Kitty brand, has collaborated with other big-time brands throughout the years including Casio, Adidas, Balenciaga, and even EVA Air, to name a few, which proves just how successful our little kitty cat has been since she was first introduced.

Hello Kitty was the brainchild of Japanese illustrator Yuko Shimizu, who was a Sanrio employee back in the ’70s. Sanrio, established in 1960, was initially a business that sold silk products, such as scarves and neckties. A couple of years later, it started selling rubber sandals. The company’s founder, Shintaro Tsuji, soon realized that sandals with cute designs and characters sold better, which pushed him to hire illustrators and cartoonists who could create designs to be added to the sandals.

The birth of Hello Kitty

Shimizu started working at Sanrio in 1974 when she was 24 years old. According to an interview with the BBC, the designers were told to deliver a “kawaii” (cute) design. Shimizu came up with a white cat with a red bow, which she finished in just a few days. She drew it in a few poses and asked her assistant which one looked the cutest, and her assistant chose the character’s side profile.

Shimizu revealed that her inspiration for the character was a white kitten that her father had gifted her when she was a child. In 1975, Hello Kitty first appeared on a vinyl coin purse in a side profile sitting position wearing her signature red bow and blue overalls. Sanrio also introduced other characters, but the Hello Kitty design was the most popular. In 1976, Sanrio opened a Gift Gate store in Los Angeles. The Hello Kitty craze then spread to the U.S. and the rest of the world soon after.

Two years after creating Hello Kitty, Shimizu left Sanrio to focus on building a family. She is also the creator of the first Sanrio character, Coro Chan, a gentle brown bear.