"The idea to build small shops for mice originated in Paris in the spring of 2016, and the first installation—a nut shop and an Italian restaurant was installed in December of 2016 in the town of Malmö, in southern Sweden," one of the members told us.
When asked, how the idea for this movement first come to be, the member told us this: "A few of us were discussing creating something together, and somewhere we found a common love for the worlds created by Swedish author Astrid Lindgren, and by the movies of Disney and Don Bluth. Where small creatures live in a world parallel to ours and use our scraps and trash for other purposes."
We were also wondering if there's any kind of hidden meaning behind these mouse-themed miniatures. "Not really anything more than spreading a bit of everyday magic to pedestrians. And something we, as a collective, would all have loved to stumble upon as children. However, all kinds of street art is, ultimately, a way to change the public space, and as such a piece of defiance, no matter how cute it happens to be," said the member.
"We love that it inspires people to build miniatures with their children; we love that we have a faithful audience, who lines up just to see tiny shops for mice. We're super happy about the social media discussions that follow every new installation, where users come up with new ways to make the installations evolve," the Anonymouse member explained.
"Hopefully, it will inspire some curiosity, and since the idea of a parallel world is so widespread, we think it connects to people's childhoods. By now, the people who know our works, already know to look for puns, recycled objects and other inside jokes. So it brings a sense of community as well," the member told Bored Panda.
"When we did the first installation we had no idea that it would be as appreciated as it became. We thought that a handful of people would find it cute. And since then we've ventured to places we never thought we'd see. And we've received photos from all over the world of people who have made their own tiny stores. So it's continuing to be quite a ride," added the member.
