Designers claim shirt was “born of a desire to show the appeal of hamsters,” but the real motivation seems to lie elsewhere.

Japan’s Mocolle is known for high-concept, unique apparel. With its name a mashup of “mousou” (“delusion” of “fantasy”) and “collection,” Mocolle specializes in fanciful fashion crossovers, such as its Lolita maternity wear and Shinto shrine maiden swimsuit.

So it’s a little strange to find out that Mocolle’s latest item of clothing is…a hamster T-shirt?

Granted, the artwork is pretty cute, with the furry little guys stuffing their cheek pouches full of sunflower seeds. You also get your choice between the ever-popular golden/Syrian hamster or a gray Djungarian breed, which is a nice bonus for those well-versed in hamster-related knowledge. But where’s Mocolle’s well-established flair at catching the eye with attention-commanding design?

Oh.

As demonstrated by spokesmodel and cosplayer Saki Miyamoto, Mocolle’s hamster T-shirt has to be worn for the full effect. Because the drawing of the hamster is positioned high on the shirt, its cheek pouches align with the wearer’s chest, which really makes the illustration pop, so to speak.

It’s not entirely clear whether the shirt absolutely requires a prodigious chest to pull off the 3-D effect, or if the artwork itself provides a visual augmentation, as with the breast-enhancing optical illusion T-shirt that went on sale in Japan last summer.

As with all of Mocolle’s designs, the Check Pouch T-shirt is being initially offered as part of a crowdfunding campaign on Japanese website Campfire. The page for the campaign, which can be found here, has 57 days left to go as of this writing, with reward tiers that include a shirt starting at 3,850 yen (US$34).

Source: Campfire via IT Media
Images: Campfire

Follow Casey on Twitter, where he wonders what the Syrian hamster he had as a kid would have to say about all this.