Atsuko Sasaki

Atsuko Sasaki was born in  Gifu, Japan.She received a graduate degree in Oil Painting from Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music in 1993.After graduation,she has continued to work as an artist, participating in-group exhibitions as well as holding solo shows. “I want to create art with wool!” “I want to use wool as my paint!” That is my world of felt ― wool art that starts with an artistic point of view. She also began wanting to create accessible artwork that anyone can hold, use, and touch. She has been working with felt for 15 years. Nature inspires her imagination. She loves the shape and organically smooth curves of plants...

All images © Atsuko Sasaki

HIROKO KUBOTA

There is always a place for creativity in the world. Come up with something unique and people will pay attention. Just ask Hiroko Kubota, the creator of a collection awe inspiring shirts that are cat embroidered. The cats are embroidered onto the shirts with great attention to detail and the result is almost life-like.

Japanese embroidery artist Hiroko Kubota was in the process of making custom sized clothes for her smaller-framed son when he made a small request: could some of the shirts have cats on them? Kubota explains her son was somewhat obsessed with cats and had collected a small library of adorable images found around the web.

After making a few cat shirts the artist posted photos of the pieces online and unsurprisingly they quickly went viral, spurring Kubota to open an Etsy shop under the brand Go!Go!5 where she started selling the shirts at an impressive price tag of around $250-$300 apiece. But price was no object for internet cat fanatics and the shirts have been snapped up almost as quickly as Kubota embroiders them.