THE SANRIO COMPANY holds a leading position in the kawaii industry, with more than 500 design characters in its portfolio. Its undisputed star character, of course, is Hello Kitty, but Sanrio's lasting contribution to the Japanese kawaii culture spreading throughout the world is far from limited to Hello Kitty - the company has produced approx. 450 design characters over the years!

© Sanrio Co., Ltd.

First launched in 1975, My Melody is the first major bunny character from Sanrio and often named as the second most popular Sanrio character after Hello Kitty. My Melody is a honest and good-natured bunny and has also been developed into a tv series and video game in 2005.

My Melody was born in the forest of Mari Land on January 18th. My Melody lives with her mother, father, grandmother and brother, Rhythm. She is honest and good-natured. Her favourite hobby is baking cookies with her mother and her favourite food is almond pound cake – which she snacks on with her best friend, a mouse named Flat.

The Sanrio artists have mastered the fine art of creating pure imagery with instant recognizability and "personality". While their character icons do not need surrounding storylines to make a genuine impression, there is a "soap opera" quality to several of Sanrio's properties, with a number of subsidiary personalities revolving around the brand character. The Sanrio style was deliberately developed to differ from bold American cartoons with aggressive colors and sharp lines - more subtle, with rounder features, more pastel colors and a kind of coziness. The characters' limbs are shorter, the view is often full frontal and the pose iconic and static. As design icons, Sanrio's kawaii properties represent an aestethic quality that embodies values like care, innocence and gentle silliness and seems to respond to basic and universal human needs, for children and adults alike.