Tomorrow, 11:30 AM EST. One Micro, one Slim. Both limited.
Chiao's bald guy arrives on two wallets, and on both of them he's up to his chest in something. A flower on one. A bathtub on the other. Open the Micro and it gets weird.
Who Felicia Chiao Is
Taiwanese-American, based in San Francisco, industrial design degree from RISD. Industrial designer by day and illustrator by night, which is why these compositions are so tightly engineered underneath all the soft watercolor.
She's run in Hi-Fructose and It's Nice That and shown with Harman Projects. She's also known for filling Moleskines cover to cover, which is where the character lives before he turns into finished work.
The bald guy is why people know her. Chiao has said she made him featureless on purpose so anyone can climb inside him. No gender, no age, no marks. Just a small round person having a feeling. It's why her comments are wall to wall with people saying some version of "this is me."
Being Submerged Is the Whole Point
Put the designs side by side. Chest-deep in flowers. Chest-deep in fish. Chest-deep in bathwater. Three times, three materials, identical posture, hands on the edge of whatever's holding him.
Entire cultures have institutionalized this. The Japanese ofuro is the soak you take once you're already clean, purely to decompress. Iceland's neighborhood geothermal pools work more like a public living room than a swimming facility. Hungary built civic life on thermal baths. Everyone arrived independently at the same finding, which is that sitting in warm water up to your chest is load-bearing infrastructure for being a person.
Chiao drew it three times without once turning it into a lecture about self-care. That's one reason it lands.
Format
Scenes from Nature is a Micro Wallet. 1.3mm, 6 to 8 cards plus folded cash, front pocket.
Afternoon Bath is a Slim Wallet. About 3mm, 12 to 16 cards. The wide format earns its keep here, because a bathtub is a horizontal object and the Slim gives it the whole length of the room.
Both are RFID-blocking, like everything we make apart from the coin pouch. Both are Tyvek, which is waterproof at the fiber level rather than through a coating that wears off. Two wallets about being in water, printed on the one material you can drop in the tub and fish back out. We didn't plan that. It's still true.
Who's Copping This
People who already have Chiao saved in a folder. You know the bald guy. You know which feeling each drawing is about. This is the first time it's something you can carry.
The anxious-brain readership. Her whole audience finds this work weirdly regulating to look at, and carrying it is a different relationship than scrolling past it.
Cozy-aesthetic collectors. The ceramic mug shelf, the plant wall, the eight-hour lo-fi playlist. Afternoon Bath belongs in that world down to the reed diffuser.
Koi people, which is a real and specific category. If you've already got Japanese fish imagery in the rotation, the Micro interior is going to finish you off.
Anyone building a matched set. Same artist, same character, one of each format. Matched without being matching.
Drop
Tomorrow, 11:30 AM EST. Scenes from Nature in the Micro Wallet collection, Afternoon Bath in the Slim Wallet collection. Both limited. Sells through, that's the run. The full collection has what else is standing.
