2022 Wrap Up

Christmas is around the corner and, as with every year, we will be taking a short break from DAME. From Wednesday 21st of December 2022 to Wednesday 4th of January 2023, we'll be taking a break from social media, emails and working on ongoing orders.

Our achievements this year

We will be coming back refreshed and ready for a new year of orders and product development, but before we sign off for the year, we wanted to take some time to highlight some of the development milestones we’ve hit this year.

Backplates

This year we have been working on expanding the range of options and features available on our masks, with one of our biggest achievements being the highly requested fully enclosing mask, in the form of an optional backplate. The backplate is designed to be separate, detachable piece that can be added to the mask at any point, allowing you to switch between fully enclosed or 3/4 mask as and when it suits you.

The backplate is listed as a separate product on our website and is available for all our current mask styles, as well as any future styles that are yet to come, meaning one can be bought and added to your mask at any time. This is just one of the many features we had in development this year, so next year we will hopefully see the release of many more of our ongoing projects.

Alice Style

The Alice face shape was the first commercial mask design made by DAME, however after troubles with the Kickstarter campaign, we instead decided to use it as the base of our semi-custom masks. After closing semi-custom orders, and finally deciding to keep them closed permanently, the well-loved face shape of the Alice design was retired.

So, in an effort to revive and bring back well-loved face shape, we released the Alice style for our generic mask range. Before release, the original design was tweaked and improved based on feedback we received for the original design. The core design, namely the size and face shape, were kept, though sharp features such as the chin and nose where softened with the cheeks also made fuller to make the overall design look less flat.

At long last, preparations are finally complete! The new Alice style Generic Mask will be launching this Friday, 28th October. An announcement will be made on our social media platforms when the page goes live. pic.twitter.com/TA9KaIy2rc

— DAME (@damekigurumi) October 26, 2022

After we finished working on the renewed face shape and a brand-new set of eye designs, we set about getting the refreshed design ready for release. Projects like this are always a large undertaking for us as, not only are we a small team, we are almost always working on multiple projects and orders at once. Whilst we are incredibly happy to have finally added a new style to our generic range, we still hope to continue adding new features, be they current or future projects, to all our mask styles.

Elf Ears

At the start of the Year, we only had elf ears available on our Ami mask style, though we quickly realised this was limiting the choices available to potential customers. In order to make sure all our mask styles had the same available options, we started working on designing elf ears for the Anna style, finally realising them earlier this year, whilst also ensuring we had an elf ear design ready to release with the Alice style.

Currently, all our generic styles have one choice of alternative ear design, with each design being bespoke to its respective mask style. We plan to expand the range of ear designs available for our generic range, both by making all current elf ear designs compatible with all current and future mask styles, as well as adding brand new ear designs. Like all things however, this will take time to development and implement.

Solid Hair Prototype

This is a project we had plans to work on for a long time, though as development of the design and mechanisms involved was very expensive and time consuming, we had to postpone working on it in order to focus on other aspects of our business.

In 2020, we were approached by Xelphie about a solid hair project and, after much discussion and explaining that development would very much be a process of trial and error, they agreed to help fund the development of their mask.

The proof of concept for solid hair is now finished!

We have been working with @xelphie9000 to make their character, but they gave us the chance to try making solid hair and see how it goes. We are all happy with the result, but what do you think? pic.twitter.com/UtCi48ydAc

— DAME (@damekigurumi) August 12, 2022

We started the project in early 2022, which began with settling on a design for the hair. The project also included an inflatable ponytail, sourced by Xelphie, though with input from us to ensure there was a proper attachment point for it to be fixed to the solid hair. One of the biggest challenges for this projects was the mechanism used to mount the solid hair to the mask, as it needed to be easy to use, secure when being worn, all whilst compromising as little as possible on the overall design aesthetic.

We are very proud of what we achieved working on this project and glad we could deliver a product Xelphie was happy with, despite our inexperience. It also taught us a lot about designing solid hair, which is knowledge we will be applying in the future as we look to design a range of solid hair styles for our generic masks. This is not something we are likely to be working on any time soon, but it is definitely on our list of planned features.

Personal goals for the direction of DAME

We recently met up to do a promotional photoshoot for the new Alice style, after which we sat down to discuss the current state of our business and what aspects of it we would like to expand upon in the future. As part of that discussion, we each gave our answer to the hypothetical question, “What would you do, or focus on, if given full control of the company”. Here is a summary of our responses:

Emily

“DAME started as group of kigurumi hobbyist who turned their passion into a business. Before the Covid lockdowns in the UK, DAME had regular face to face meetings and made plans for photoshoots and future promotions. Lockdowns put a stop to most of those plans and fun we had with kigurumi photoshoots. I would like to see photoshoots come back into focus.

As photography was our original intent as group rather than mask making, I would like to see us go back to trying to do more for the kigurumi community in the UK and do more photography focused things. This year, I want to see us bringing in a larger variety of models for photoshoots and taking pictures of kigurumi players more often. I hope this brings more fun back into aspects of the business and more motivation within DAME by remembering why we started making kigurumi costumes in first place.”

Charlotte

“I would push us to make our masks more modular, allowing people to easily perform as multiple characters for cheaper by reusing some of the same components across all the characters. If we make features detachable then it makes it possible for people to change their mask in fun and interesting ways, and if we can make it easy to do then it would be possible to swap elements of your mask mid-way through a set of photos.

For example, changing from long hair to short hair with ponytails to make it look like the character has tied their hair up or to change from a closed mouth mask shell to open mouth or alternative eyes to try and express different emotions.”

Lillian

“I would like to see what we could achieve if we had time to focus on larger, more experimental projects. I am quite interested in experimenting with using different kinds of materials for both the shell itself and the hair, using mechanical or electronic components to add interesting features, perhaps even finding an interesting way of integrating a mask with a bodysuit.

More achievably though, I would also quite like to focus on expanding the kinds of props and accessories we can produce to accompany our masks. Not only would it add to our repertoire as a business, but it would also allow me to expand my skills as a 3D designer.”

Thats a wrap

If you made it this far, thanks for reading! Admittedly, the first half of this blog was us patting ourselves on the back a little, but we hope the latter half at least gave you some interesting insight into us as individuals. Thats it from us for now though, so we'll see you in 2023.

Merry Christmas and happy holidays!