Art toys as a playground: Matthias Pou’s international journey

Hello Kitty, Snoopy, Tokidoki unicorns and Warner Bros. characters: these iconic figurines from the world of art toys are true miniature works of art. After more than twenty years spent between Europe and Asia, Matthias Pou chose Montréal to launch Orion +, a design and technical consulting firm specializing in luxury figurines. Montréal is now his home base. Working out of Montréal Cowork, he is counting on Quebec’s largest city to develop this market in North America.

“What appeals to me most is the complexity of carrying out a project,” he says without hesitation when we meet at Montréal Cowork.

Tall and blond, with light-coloured eyes and in his late forties, Matthias keeps a low profile. He likes to work in the same spot in the lounge on Montréal Cowork’s second floor. With his headphones on, surrounded by his two colleagues Kevin and Alyssa, he now has his familiar surroundings, his routine and his coworking friends.

Particularly attuned to the atmosphere around him, he feels at home in this shared workspace.

He discovered Montréal Cowork by chance.

“Finding yourself in a city you don’t know, especially when you work from home, isn’t easy. Here, it’s a space where you can easily meet people,” he explains.

Today, Matthias runs Orion + and supports artists, brands and licence holders in designing and manufacturing collectible figurines.

“You want to create a promotional, artistic or technological object, like a luxury pop-culture figurine. You don’t know how to go about it, and you need someone who can support you with the art direction, 3D modelling or project engineering. You come to us, and we provide that consulting and project oversight expertise for you,” he explains.

That expertise was not built overnight.

From Normandy to Asia

Before arriving in Montréal in the summer of 2024 and setting up his own business, Matthias built a solid foundation of experience through numerous professional adventures abroad.

Originally from Normandy but born in Le Mans, he began his career in an entirely different world.

“My first job was with Norbert Dentressangle, a trucking company,” he recalls. “I arranged return loads for trucks travelling from northern England to southern Europe. That was my job.”

Initially trained in electronics and holding a university diploma in logistics and transportation management, he soon felt the urge to move to Paris. Although he worked in both of those sectors, he quickly moved into a very different world: book and magazine publishing, and printing on objects.

One thing led to another, and Matthias specialized, discovering a genuine enthusiasm for objects.

“I managed to build up experience... what I developed most was the artistic side,” he shares.

He then became passionate about the various creative movements associated with objects and figurines.

“There were all sorts of cultural references from different backgrounds. It’s cross-cultural at every level. It connects street art, pop art and the luxury world,” he says.

In 2004, he moved to London for four years to develop the English market.

“In England, I developed very strong business relationships with English-speaking publishers... but after four years there, I realized that English-speaking countries found it easy to work directly with Asia, something French people in small publishing companies rarely, if ever, did,” he explains.

From there, he decided to move to mainland China, heading for Shenzhen. For him, being in Asia and managing British clients directly from there was a major advantage and an obvious strategic decision.

Another five years passed. His experience grew, and he once again felt the urge to move forward. At that time, “I was doing quite a bit of work in the Japanese market,” he acknowledges.

While China was then a supplier market, Japan was clearly a customer market. Matthias packed his bags again and took his whole family to the Land of the Rising Sun for three years, heading for Tokyo.

“After Tokyo, I spent eight years in Hong Kong. Because of COVID, it lasted longer than planned, since originally I wanted to return to Europe... It was during the pandemic that I realized I wanted to do very different things.”

The turning point

While the pandemic made him realize he wanted to strike out on his own professionally, the idea of settling in Quebec had already taken root.

The summer of 2024 brought the move to Montréal. A new life began.

“I spent a lot of my time in big, highly competitive cities where you had to perform, where social and financial success was the norm. I think that after a while, I no longer wanted that. And I found Montréal offered a good balance in that respect.”

Montréal, a place to make things happen

Montréal offers not only a balanced lifestyle, but also an ideal ecosystem for his business.

Historically, the city has always attracted artists, particularly thanks to a cost of living more affordable than Toronto, Vancouver, New York or Paris.

The first city in North America to be named a UNESCO City of Design in 2006, Montréal has long valued experimentation, artistic expression and design in all its forms.

Today, Matthias works with graphic artists as well as tattoo artists who have their own visual worlds and want to create objects based on their art.

“A lot of people were looking for new media to express themselves and didn’t have the industrial capabilities to develop new products or new ways of doing things,” he observes.

Another segment of his clientele holds licences to manufacture Hello Kitty or Warner Bros. figurines, but does not necessarily have a command of the manufacturing processes.

“What looks simple and streamlined is complex to make,” he admits.

After all, adapting an artist’s creative process to reproduce a miniature work of pop-culture art is often a technical challenge.

Breaking down barriers between artistic worlds

Drawing on his international experience and aware of the richness of Montréal’s ecosystem, Matthias now wants to bring different artists together on a single platform.

“There’s no place in Montréal that physically brings together artists from different backgrounds. You’ll find galleries specializing in contemporary art or other art forms, but you won’t find a place that brings together street art, graffiti artists, tattoo artists and artists,” he observes.

His aim is clear: to try to break down the barriers within Montréal’s underground and urban art scene.

“There are lots of different cultural ideas in street art, a variety of subcultures. Major luxury brands will partner with a graffiti artist, sometimes even with the music scene.

Often, those are the artists who later become well known. That’s where it gets interesting for us,” he explains.

Today, his clients are mainly in Japan and Europe. From Montréal Cowork, Matthias relies on his strong network of technical partners and subcontractors to bring the projects entrusted to him to life.

The coworking space on Saint-Denis Street has become the setting for his ambitions.

“At the coworking space, I’ve met lots of people from different generations who are also full of energy and have a positive message,” he shares.

If an entrepreneur’s talent lies in seeing needs where others do not, perhaps his greatest achievement is having found his own: working in a sector where he enjoys having fun.

Article credit: Hélène Lequitte