Photo by SmallandRound via flickr

Shawnimal‘s started as a simple college art project by Shawn Smith, and has since grown to be one of the leaders of designer plush. I think if it wasn’t for his innovations and pursuit of the felted medium, we wouldn’t have as much awesome plush on the hot charts as we do today. He’s also an incredible wordsmith, pummeling me in Lexulous on Facebook (90pts for Agility? who knew “qis” was a word? Shawn does). I have a few plushies, but my absolute favorite piece is his BUD custom… which I picked up last year at Hero and Sound‘s custom show.

Shawn is on my my short list of artists I’d kill to meet/hang/stalk, and not just because he looks adorable. Check out the Vimby interview that was just posted; get a look at the workshop and people helping Shawnimals do what they do best: Rule.

Shawnimals / Vimby