It'll be a while before she has a sheet done of her by myself, but for the moment this was a little doodle I had originally sat on of Lapres which I decided to make into a custom Lanyard for myself featuring my newest girly, Boba, the Bubble Tea Gryphon!

The story behind her is I've always wanted a fursuit of my own but I feel lost in this void of my own characters. Lapres would make a fun character to wear because she's mischievous but I have some personal problems with making her. For her I've managed to make her anatomy almost impossible to wear as a person and anything short of how I draw her I don't think I'd feel happy wearing it. T_T This stems from other artist interpretations of her and I think going with something else would make me happier as every artist who makes suits has their own style.

Kalin would be a gorgeous fursuit to have and to match  slaton but shes not an "acting out" character and I feel like she'd be much more reserved to match the character. That's no good as that's now how I want to suit. T_T

So we looked at pre-made suits or second hand suits for ages, but bids would go crazy on Dealers Den or Furbuy, and then there is no guarantee that the suit would fit right, or there were so many other designs that just didn't feel like something I could attach myself to. I honestly never thought I'd over think this as much as I ended up doing so it has been an internal fight for the last year trying to figure out what to do. I kept trying to convince myself to just give Lapres a try, but I don't think I'd be happy with her at the end of the day no matter what maker I went to - this is where my artistic OCD of my own character comes into play and the knowledge that she isn't what I wanted her to be but for personal reasons she's stuck looking as she does.

So this is where  slaton comes in. Another friend of mine was opening and knowing it meant something to me maybe ask about an artistic liberty suit? I grew a pair and asked and gave her the colour pallet that I like wearing every day (neutrals, I'm a boho-chic sort of personal) and originally was going to ask for a deer, however she had made a gryphon as her own personal character that I had fallen in love with when I saw her at my very first CFz in 2013! I had my Lapres kigu made by suuvalkyrie and we bounced around together, it was too cute!! After remembering that I thought "maybe a sister character to Lapres and Keri" and she drew up this cute little gryph reference sheet which as soon as I saw her my heart melted. She was perfect!

Instantaneously I felt connected to this character, it was the direction i wanted Lapres to go in last year before she had her chibi redesign. I had originally purchased a gryphon from muramuri to use as the new Lapres but leviathan248 pleaded I keep her the way she was, with her Lapres colours, the teal and orange, which is why she's stayed that way. I wanted her to follow me in my personal progression and have a neutral colour change as Lapres is too bright for me personally but hey-ho, I now have this new little gryphon which screams me in every way possible.

The artist is  kerijiano and she is absolutely lovely. If you put this character between Lapres and Keri you'd be able to see the resemblance between the three.

As for her name, she gave her some spots which resemble Keri as shes an owl/snow leopard so this character followed suit! Because her spots are pretty cutely rounded on the original reference sheet that Keri made my mind started going to circles and what was circular?

Woah, my favourite snack/drink is circular and her colours! Boba Milk Tea! I have many fond memories drinking boba with my son and my best friends so it was like a lightbulb wen toff and decided to go that route!

Her personality is the amalgamation of Lapres and Kalin - she loves her other half deeply, absolutely loves playing tricks and this is a character I know I could run around in and wreak havoc.

To me she is finally everything I wanted in a character.


As an artist, it might sound silly that I can't seem to design my own characters and just be happy with them, I feel like they're never finished and that things can change over time, like Kalins hair for example. I still don't know how I want to style that mess, haha, and over time her colourings have morphed from dark dark brown to tan and white. Having someone else completely take the reins and run with Boba she's my only character I can look at and think "She's complete" which is a novelty feeling for me. @_@

I know, TLDR; but I'm happy I got the opportunity to sit down and write this out.

If you see me running around come squeak with me! I've gone as far as being proper furry trash with this character as my personal hand bag matches her, my bracelets, my lanyard, badges and even my belt has boba on it. #sad


Original Design ©  kerijiano
Artwork and Ownership ©  lapres

I'll be making some cute boba tea gear to sell because the fabric design I had done was too cute not to. @^@