Patents on the soles of your shoes...: Oh, patents! Kidrobot® Dunny™ collectibles (1)

Wednesday, September 27, 2023

Oh, patents! Kidrobot® Dunny™ collectibles (1)

Founded in 2002 by the serial entrepreneur, author, filmmaker, designer, and programmer, Paul Budnitz, Kidrobot® is a custom, limited edition, collectible-designer-toy company that also produces signature apparel and lifestyle accessories. Dunny™, launched in 2004, is a blank platform toy, that was originally given to street artists to customize, and then sold as limited edition collectibles, ushering in the world 3D designer maker toys.

The name Dunny™ is a portmanteau term that combines “Devil + Bunny”, used in street art. The rest is history, because Kidrobot® Dunny™ collectable designer toys have sold worldwide, in partnership with mega toymakers such as Sanrio, Disney, and Hasbro,; as well as museums, such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, for whom more than 150 Dunny™ art designer toys were produced. Additional blank designer collectible toys were made in partnership with famous fashion designers such as Louis Vuitton, Prada, Hermes, and Karl Lagerfeld. In fact, the original Kidrobot® company was acquired in 2014 by the National Entertainment Collectibles Association Inc., after having written the book on designer collectible toys in the adult world.

Kidrobot® Dunny™ brings together art, creativity, 3-D printing and maker entrepreneurship, which means that such opposites are no longer conflicting forces for the founder of Kidrobot® and his friends. The artists commissioned to make the collectibles, and everyone else who has followed suit, making designer toys for personal or more lucrative purposes, or who have worked to customize the original blank Dunny™.

Below, the patented doll, with the head that rotates 360-degrees, and mobile arms, infinitely customisable, with big bunny ears for Dunny™, softer vinyl movable parts like Munny™, and lately the Superplastic®, superlimited, designer figures that are 3D rendered, becoming animated in videos.

The recently expired US design patent USD569454S, titled Doll, was originally awarded on May 20, 2008. Below, the patent Figure 1 drawing, together with eight collector Dunny™ toys. the dotted lines are not part of the claimed design.