Bewilderbeest capsule collection to be unveiled at PG Live
Describing his job title as chief nitwit, Iain Hamilton has expanded his Bewilderbeest licensing programme with a capsule collection of 12 of his absurdly bonkers greetings designs for Great British Card Company (GBCC).
The range will be launched at PG Live in June and this latest deal, brokered by art licensing and design company The London Studio, follows on from Iain’s tie-up with Lesser & Pavey featuring his quirky characters on gifts and homewares after the company discovered the newbie publisher on his PG Live stand last year.
It continues the purple patch for the talented publisher whose downright daft humorous cards made it to the finals of three categories in The Henries Awards, while Iain – who calls himself the chief nitwit – was crowned Most Promising Young Designer 2022.
And it was The Henries that led to Bewilderbeest’s very funny and meticulously-drawn artwork being discovered by The London Studio’s founder and director Soula Zavacopoulos, who said: “I’m thrilled to be helping Iain develop and grow his unique and witty brand through this partnership.”
In her other role as consultant and buyer for online greeting card retailer Funky Pigeon Soula took part in the judging day for the awards back in August where she was so impressed by the publisher’s work that they teamed up to introduce existing Bewilderbeest designs to the online platform, and she has now expanded that relationship to arrange the licence with GBCC.
Iain – who pranked his social media followers with an April Fool’s video that can be seen below – said: “We were very excited to be asked by Soula to work with GBCC. I was let loose to be my usual absurd self, and the first batch of daft ideas that I came up with are the ones that we agreed to go ahead with. We really look forward to seeing our nonsense on shelves very soon!”
Through The London Studio, GBCC commissioned Bewilderbeest to create a capsule collection of 12 exclusive designs, with creative director Lucy Ledger working with Soula to develop the brief for the new range.
The exclusive collection created for this agreement complements Bewilderbeest’s own card ranges while enabling the brand to reach new customers through GBCC’s wide network and distribution power both in the UK and overseas in nearly 30 countries.
Lucy said: “The London Studio has a great reputation for its partnerships – and Bewilderbeest is a great example of this. We have admired Iain’s work for a while and are so glad The London Studio represents him. We have formed a great creative partnership as this humour fits our customer base exactly and this absurd brand has been a delight to work with. We’re looking forward to more collaborations with Bewilderbeest in the near future.”
To see GBCC’s Bewilderbeest collection in the flesh, head to PG Live, which runs Tuesday and Wednesday, 6-7 June, at London’s Business Design Centre. GBCC is one of 200 companies that will be exhibiting, from the major companies to brand new start-ups. To register to attend click here.
