Ruffles is one of multiple characters I designed in answer to a brief from Tesco, the UK’s biggest retailer.
They requested a new cute character which, whilst still being huggably appealing, was to be different to other well established cute characters in the greetings market. Instead of just choosing one character, they actually picked up two, this guy as well as Little Oink, a tiny pig which you can read all about here.
Ruffles is a shy little raccoon. Although often seen as a bit of a pest, raccoons work perfectly as a cute characters due to their fluffiness, cute proportions and sad banded eyes. It also helps that they have tiny little hands which really help to add expression to the character poses. Raccoons are also quite mischievous which allows for a lot of fun situations to draw!
When illustrating a love situation for cute cards, which would typically involve a male and a female character, it’s quite common to simply use a duplicate of the main character in different clothing. Neither I, nor the Tesco card buyer was keen on this approach, so I designed a secondary female character, Maple, especially for this purpose.
Brand concept creation and naming
Character design and illustration
Logo design
Providing feedback on the final design of cards
