About the studio
Houbunsha was founded July 10, 1950, the successor to Shobunkan, which had been established in 1946 by Yoshichika Koso. Based in Bunkyo, Tokyo, it made history early by launching Japan's first weekly manga magazine, Weekly Manga Times, and later Manga Time (1981), the first monthly four-panel manga magazine, and Manga Time Kirara (2002), which became a defining imprint for the moe 4-koma genre. *One publisher accidentally inventing an entire manga subculture through a magazine format choice.* K-On!, Is the Order a Rabbit?, and Yuru Camp all trace back to Manga Time Kirara serialization. Over 75 years since its founding, Houbunsha's influence on a very specific, hugely popular corner of anime, gentle, character-focused slice-of-life comedy, is honestly hard to overstate, given how many beloved series trace back to that one magazine imprint.