Background
After many rounds of on-site research on Nagoya Castle, I realized that most people didn’t bother looking at the other 5 places other than Honmaru Palace and the actual Nagoya Castle. I also learned about the existence of Hana-chan, a stray cat that is loved by the people working at Nagoya Castle and visitors. I also discovered that visitors uploaded Hana-chan's photos on twitter / Instagram even though Nagoya Castle did not officially post anything about Hana-chan.

The challenge
The challenge was how to spark interest in Nagoya Castle in a new perspective while retaining Nagoya Castle’s charm, which eventually will result in low-cost marketing whereby visitors start advertising Nagoya Castle on their own.

The approach
Created Nyagoya, a new souvenir brand based on Nagoya castle’s stray cat, Hana-chan, who is well-known within the castle’s employees and visitors. Current product line features a set of illustrated coaster of 7 different locations which comes in a set with a mini pamphlet guide to all the individual places. By incorporating the cat, tourists can learn about Nagoya castle in a different perspective. Hana-chan presence is unique to Nagoya Castle therefore this brand aim to eventually garner more interests among tourists.

The results
When we are exhibiting our works in Honmaru Palace, many visitors & Nagoya Castle staff members approached me directly wanting to know more about my work. I received a lot of pleasant feedback, especially comments like “Where can we buy this?” , “I wish it will be a real commercial product!” makes me really happy. I'm also grateful that the people who followed me went to visit the exhibition because of Nyagoya’s instagram. Nyagoya was broadcasted on Tokai TV. Click on the link to view it.