Miraitowa and Someity
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Miraitowa (Japanese: ミライトワ) is the official mascot of the 2020 Summer Olympics, and Someity (Japanese: ソメイティ) is the official mascot of the 2020 Summer Paralympics. The events were held in Tokyo, Japan, in 2021. The checkered design on both mascots was inspired by the Tokyo 2020 official logo, which uses a checkered pattern called ichimatsu moyo that was popular during the Edo period. Someity's pink design was inspired by cherry blossoms. Both fictional characters have various superpowers, such as teleportation.
Created by Japanese artist Ryo Taniguchi (Japanese: 谷口亮), the mascots were selected from a design competition organized by the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee in late 2017 and early 2018. A total of 2,042 candidate designs were submitted to the committee, which then selected three pairs of unnamed mascot designs from the batch to present to Japanese elementary school students for the final decision. The results of the selection were announced on 28 February 2018, and the mascots were named on 22 July 2018. Miraitowa is named after the Japanese words for "future" (未来, mirai) and "eternity" (永久, towa), and Someity is named after someiyoshino (ソメイヨシノ), a type of cherry blossom. Someity's name also echoes the English phrase "so mighty". The mascots helped finance the Tokyo Games through merchandising and licensing deals.