Witch Hat Atelier Volume 1 by Kamome Shirahama (trans. Stephen Kohler, letters Lys Blakeslee) seriously impressed me. I’m a lifelong manga fan who’s had the pleasure of reading across eras, and it’s rare that the first volume of a series, even one I enjoy, leaves me feeling there’s almost no room for improvement.

Witch Hat Atelier Vol. 1 introduces us to the world via a young girl, Coco, thrust into a secret world of magic through what seems to be a combination of luck and her own ambitions. While the structure of this story and the characters she meet feel a by-the-numbers, there are occasional, deeper glances at characters who have deeper motivations than they might seem. For a first volume of an ongoing series, I think it did an excellent job of introducing the players and the situation. Given that Witch Hat Atelier is a serialized manga, I expect the easy-to-follow story is meant to draw the reader in and introduce them to the world. Personally, I would have preferred just a touch more nuance in the character writing than the few hints we saw, but this first volume moves at a breathless pace with little time to. Coco’s moments of triumph feel earned, if not a bit predictable, and readers who are familiar with school-setting manga may get the sense that some of the character conflicts are so guaranteed to be resolved that it feels like an unnecessary cliché to include them.

The art and world building are what set this series apart for me. Shirahama manages to draw the stylistic influences of Moto Hagio, Alphonse Mucha, and Jean Giraud into something that feels uniquely timeless. The world feels lived-in, the magic system detailed and well-considered. Almost seeming like a push-back against its own obvious Harry Potter influences, the characters do wear witch robes and hats, but each of the characters we meet within the first volume has their own style. Some even wear accessories that seem to speak toward different cultural backgrounds. Names and character skin tones hint that even though this world shares DNA with European fantasy that its world is a diverse one.

All in all, an extremely promising start. I foresee this one exploding once the anime deigns the screens, as it’s already enjoying quite a lot of popularity in some fandom spaces.