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| Rough: Nakano | |||
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"Select Toy Shop Rough" specializes in cutting-edge designer toys rather than merchandising tie-ins, and they have the most original-looking toy line-up in all of Nakano Broadway.
Much of Rough's stuff falls into the category of "urban vinyl action figures" - comic-book-styled caricatures made from rotocast vinyl that often show a hiphop/cyberpunk sensibility. Urban vinyl started out as an underground artistic movement, springing up in Hong Kong around 1997 and then spreading to Singapore, Japan and the UK. In the past few years it's become increasingly popular among savvy collectors, especially for limited-production items. Michael Lau and Jason Siu - two leading Hong Kong designers in this realm - are represented by several items here. Our favorite was Siu's large "speaker-head" figures - somewhat sci-fi-looking characters with actual audio speakers for heads (Y20,000). Also on display were other Siu creations like "Marshmallow", a gooey character based on one of his early comics, and Lau's whimsical "Gardener" series of characters, one of whom had a cardboard box for a head. Rough also commissions original designs under the label Roughtoyz. At the moment these include their very colorful troll-like "Kobito" vinyl figures (Y6000 each) and their line of Kinghoo toys - stylized monkeys with long flexible arms that can hang from string or wires. by Robb Satterwhite |
Rough
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