We’re getting closer to Christmas—for many, that means presents, and for the young and young at heart, Santa. But now Santa’s fiendish friend from folklore is getting the spotlight in this adorable new plush toy from Warpo—the team behind the retro Legends of Cthulhu figures
Like Legends of Cthluhu before it, Warpo’s Krampus plush—or to give it its full name, Don’t Cuddle The Krampus!—has its roots in classic toy design. While Legends capitalised on the 70s 3.75” action figure boom, the Krampus is an homage to all the creepy, gross-out monster toys of the 1980s, like Boglins, My Pet Monster, or Madballs.
The 18.5” tall plush toy is based on the the Germanic folklore creature that would, in contrast to Saint Nicholas, kidnap children who had been naughty throughout the year. Although in the modern day the Krampus dishes out coal to naughty children, as Santa would, in the original tales the devilish creature would simply snatch up a young miscreant in his sack and cart them off to hell as a snack—so aside from the Krampus itself, you also get three plush figures of naughty kids to stuff in the monster’s sack.
But as well a first look at the final toy, we’ve also got an exclusive gallery of images looking at the production of the figure itself. Warpo collaborated with the classic Madballs illustrator Jim Gronan and My Pet Monster—several features of which inspire the looks of the Krampus design here—plush artist Donna Miranda to help get the aesthetic of both the packaging and the toy itself to be evocative of the classic 1980s monster toy lines, while keeping a modern look that makes it feel like a toy made in 2015.
Want a cuddly Krampus of your very own? Warpo have developed a Kickstarter campaign to fund manufacturing and shipping the toys out, which has just gone live. Access to the toy itself is available at the $80 tier, or $65 for a limited number of “Early Bird” backers. If you want to know more about other backer rewards and tier pricing, you can find out more at the link below.
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