mypetsies

Realistic Cat Toy – Cat Replicas

Have you ever wanted a stuffed cat that looks real and is a replica of your own cat?

Perhaps not…it certainly wasn’t something I had any particular desire for until I saw Petsie stuffed cat replicas (check them out in the gallery below) but once you’ve seen just how realistic they can look it’s hard not to want one making of your own cat!

Don’t worry these are not cat taxidermy examples! Instead, they are hand-stitched, hand-painted life-like replicas of peoples real-life pets, they make a great gift for any cat lover, particularly someone who is away from home and misses their cat.

Stuffed Cats That Look Real

Petsies specialise in customised pet gifts and not just of cats – if you have a dog, horse, pig, rabbit, bunny, rat, bird or even a guinea pig you can get a stuffed version of your pet made with them!

The process of getting your stuffed toy cat is very simple:

  1. Take a few good quality pictures of your cat from different angles, make sure the lighting is good, there isn’t too much shadow and that your cat stands out clearly from the background.
  2. Send them over to Petsies via their website (use this link).
  3. Wait for your stuffed cat to arrive in the post (Petsies is a US-based company but they do deliver to the UK).

They are the perfect gift for a cat-loving friend, and if looked after will last for years to come. They can also serve as a tasteful memorial of a much-loved cat which has passed away.

Each and every Petsie is handmade made with love, care and attention so you can be sure that yours will not disappoint.

These aren’t like your average plush cats made from teddy bear style materials, instead, each pet is created with speciality furs, noses & eyes which are selected to match your real-life cat’s features as closely as possible.

They also use advanced airbrushing techniques which allow them to match your pets coat markings extremely closely.

Watch the video below to see just how much detail goes into the creation of each pet’s coat:

Learning to airbrush a Petsie takes 3-4 months of on-the-job learning, and actually painting a pet can take around 4 hours!

When you consider the amount of skill, talent and time it takes to make these soft toys look so realistic the price (see it here) actually begins to seem quite low.

How Are The Toy Cats Made?

Once you have sent your photos into the Petsies team they get straight to work.

This involves first measuring out then cutting every individual piece of fabric so that your Petsie will have the same physical build as your real pet. These pieces are then stitched together and the fabric is filled up and bulked out.

Next special details are added, this includes things such as custom eye and nose colourings.

Then (and this part takes the longest) the polyester fur is painstakingly airbrushed to precisely match the colouring of your cat.

Then it is left to dry, packaged up and sent on its way to you!

Who Are Petsies?

Petsies is the U.S based (don’t worry they do ship to the U.K) sister company of Budsies. Those of you who have your finger on the pulse of all things social media may have heard of Budsies – they take kids drawings (any drawings in fact) and turn them into a real-life monster (or whatever it is your child has drawn), the results are often as hilarious as they are endearing.

Petsies takes a similar idea (minus the drawing) and turns photos of your cat into a lifelike replica. The company was launched back in 2013 and since then they have created over 70,000 bespoke soft toys (or plushies as they like to call them) – so you can be confident that by now they definitely know what they are doing.

Together Petsies & Budsies have featured on Shark Tank, BuzzFeed, Oprah Magazine, The New York Times and loads more…and you don’t have to look far on the internet to see that their toys are thoroughly loved.

Petsies also supply personalised pet pillows, the process for these is much the same send them some good pictures of your pet, submit them via their website and wait for your pillow to turn up! These are cheaper than the realistic-looking pet products and make a good alternative if your budget is more limited. The cushions are made to fit the shape of your pet so you can have a good snuggle with them in bed or on the sofa without getting a face full of fur!

They also do a range of novelty pet gifts which includes amusing items such as bandanas, ties, angle wings, a bow tie, hair bow, a crown, a santa hat, a bling collar and more!


If you do decide to get one please get in touch and share some images of your cat with their Petsie via our Facebook page – we’d love to see it!