With the absolute dearth of anime being released for the Spring season, it’s not hard to think that fans might have missed an announcement here or there. But one announcement has come up this month that fans should be sure not to miss: Witch Hat Atelier is getting an anime!
This news doesn’t come as a surprise for those familiar with the franchise. First released by author Kamome Shirahama in 2016, the series has been quite the sleeper hit in the West, despite receiving a number of awards in Japan, France, and Spain. With any luck, the introduction of the anime will herald a rise in popularity for the series, as it so richly deserves.
So, far there’s no word yet on a release timeframe, or if an animation studio has been greenlit for the project. But Kodansha’s Japanese YouTube channel released a teaser trailer for the anime, giving everyone a little taste of what to expect.
For those who’ve decided they need more than just that sneak peek, Kodansha’s English site has a full preview of Witch Hat Atelier’s first chapter.
And what a sneak peek it was! Shirahama manages to tell an age-old story of a young person finding a way to their dreams and the journey it will inevitably take them on with incredible swiftness and clarity. Shirahama then seamlessly blends that story with art that has not only vivid attention to detail but a color palette that invokes the fairy tales of old.
The first few pages of the manga are rich with color, even when the saturation tends to lean towards the fluid muteness of watercolor paintings. It truly feels like you’re stepping into the beginnings of a grand fairytale that draws you in from the first page and leaves you wanting more by the last. Whoever takes on the anime and manages to get that feeling down correctly will no doubt make a name for themselves.
Witch Hat Atelier currently has eight volumes, with a spinoff manga Witch Hat Kitchen currently only available in Japan. The synopsis for Witch Hat Atelier is below:
“In a world where everyone takes wonders like magic spells and dragons for granted, Coco is a girl with a simple dream: she wants to be a witch. But everybody knows magicians are born, not made, and Coco was not born with a gift for magic. Resigned to her un-magical life, Coco is about to give up on her dream to become a witch … until the day she meets Qifrey, a mysterious, traveling magician. After secretly seeing Qifrey perform magic in a way she’s never seen before, Coco soon learns what everybody “knows” might not be the truth, and discovers that her magical dream may not be as far away as it may seem …”
Source: Witch Hat Atelier website, Kodansha (US)
