'Purrmaids' combine everything great about the internet into one cute necklace
Cats, mermaids, and unicorns are the kings and queens of the internet. Who would have guessed that if you combine them all together, they would make for an adorable pendant?
Etsy shop Girl and Her Cat specializes in creating custom "purrmaid" pendants for those who love cats in all their forms, including unicorn and mermaid. All items in the shop are made out of polymer clay by Sarah Boyd in Missouri, who was inspired to make them after doing some internet surfing of her own with her older sister on Pinterest.
"My first sale on Etsy was actually an illustration," Boyd told us. "I studied graphic design in college, so I never dipped much into clay, but I fell absolutely in love with polymer clay."
Boyd's purrmaids sell for $30 and are completely customizable, and she encourages her customers to tell her exactly what they want. In the description of the item in her shop, she states, "As well as any cat color, I can even reference a picture of your fur baby so it's as close to your dream as possible." Customers are at liberty to choose everything, from how the tail is shaped to the colors.
Boyd estimates that each purrmaid takes her around 3-5 hours to make, more if the purrmaid has anything on its head like a flower crown or unicorn.
"Since March 18, 2017, I'd say I've made about 60-70 purrmaids including custom orders I've completed," Boyd shared. "I still have around 20-30 custom orders to still be completed."
Even with this backlog, she takes new orders every day, letting her customers know that wait time ranges from 6-8 weeks.
Boyd's shop gained popularity after she made a concerted effort to promote it on social media platforms. Over the past couple of months, Etsy has become Boyd's full-time job.
Since these purrmaids are completely customizable, we had to ask if she's gotten any outrageous requests. And surprisingly, Boyd said she had not.
"The craziest thing about requests has been people thinking someone with the word 'cat' in their store name would judge them for loving their cat [so] much as to get a custom piece," Boyd commented. "I love my cat, and there's no shame in having 40 pictures of your cat in your phone."
We hope cat lovers and owners everywhere are feeling validated right about now.
Outside of purrmaids, Boyd also routinely offers other animal pendants as well.
"This last update I had a bunny in a swimsuit, last week I had a chubby raccoon," Boyd said. "I've done unipandamaids which is a unicorn/panda/mermaid and people loved it! So I will be focusing on those in my next update this coming week, as well as a pugmaid I'm working on."
Pugmaid?! We don't think the internet will be ready.
Topics Animals
Christine is a Web Culture Intern at Mashable. She has previously written for FanSided and Saturday Down South. She has a B.A. from the University of California, San Diego and an M.S. from Hunter College. Before she started writing, she worked in education as a teacher and school leader for four years. Her special talents include being able to quote The Office on command, playing non-stop Overwatch for hours, and composing only the wittiest of Tweets (her own opinion).
