What is the Hobonichi MOTHER Project?

The Hobonichi MOTHER Project launched on April 30, 2020, when Hobonichi announced its first flagship book, Mother: The Complete Scripts, followed on May 20 by the reveal of the Pollyanna tribute comic. The Project is Hobonichi's standing program for the Mother series: publishing, exhibitions and merchandise, run from Itoi's own company rather than licensed out.

Its output since 2020 has the shape of an archive being opened drawer by drawer: the Complete Scripts and two Pollyanna volumes in print; the Secret of MOTHER 2 development exhibition in 2024; the complete clay figures at MOTHER no Katachi in 2025; and a permanent MOTHER shop on 1101.com selling plush, pins, stationery and apparel.

The Project also works in physical space. Its pop-up shop MOTHER no Omise ran at Umeda Loft from November 19 to December 6, 2020, with further pop-ups in Osaka and Tokyo that season, and sellouts followed by restocks became the rhythm fans learned to watch.

For a collector, the Project redraws the map: the center of the Mother market is no longer the secondhand trade in 1990s objects, but a living official store whose print runs and restocks set the modern shelf.