“After successfully reviving some of our older designs we felt it was time to unleash something new and fresh for the ILYY line-up. Going through our models we realized there was no full-sized, medium width entry.
Full-size yoyos with a slimmer profile below 40mm always feel special when throwing them around. They ooze some kind of easiness and relaxing energy that wider yoyos usually lack.
It is named after a beloved German pastry, a jelly-donut without a center hole. Why? Simply because everyone who tried a Krapfen falls in love with it.
For our entry into this range we wanted something very ILYY-like that encapsulates our design language and philosophy in terms of playing style and understatement. We thus went with a very comfortable organic shape that inherits some of the Lio’s mojo but adds its own aesthetic style. We also decided this new yoyo should have a fade anodization, never seen before on an ILYY, but with grace and class. The Krapfen combines a fresh design with known and loved ILYY-aesthetics.
Weight was kept fairly low for the Krapfen at 62g due to the more compact design. It feels just right when throwing. With its beefy rims and carefully placed mass, the Krapfen is a great performer with plenty of spin time and power while still keeping the great feeling of easiness alive. We noticed a surprising effect when giving the Krapfen a few hours of undivided attention. It feels like becoming a standard issue of a yoyo. Something that would sit in an institute of standards. A yoyo that is used to compare bearings, pads etc.”
Initial Run
The initial run of the Krapfen came out in February 2023. 39 Red/Orange fade colorways with Soda Blasted finish were made.
2nd Run
The second run of the Krafen arrived in December 2023. This time 39 yo-yos were made with a Rosé/Blue fade and a Soda Blasted finish.
At ILYY, we do not necessarily follow the path of ever improving performance. Instead, our goal has always been to explore niches we haven’t touched before, regardless of performance. This led us to create yoyos like the Krapfen or the PYBIT, both by no means competition-oriented designs. Some of these considerations even became our standard at ILYY like the 4 mm gap width. Keeping true to this design philosophy of seeking untouched ground regardless of the outcome, there is one design niche we have not covered: a modern competition yoyo Being a competition-oriented design, it should reside above all other ILYYs in terms of raw capability, the usual limits and ideas left far behind, a true testament to power, stability and maneuverability.
This is the Numen.
All bi-metal ILYYs to this point featured an inner ring keeping the outer appearance of the yoyo undisturbed. While offering very slick and pleasing aesthetics, this is a compromise in terms of rim weight capabilities, as the ring cannot be placed in the outermost region of the body. The Numen’s performance-oriented concept clearly needed outer rings to benefit the most from the bi-metal construction.
In order to stay true to our slick and understatement design philosophy we gave the intersection area small radii to comfort the profile lines to a haptically and optically pleasing conjunction. Furthermore, we went with blasted and electroplated rings to take on the matte aesthetics of the blasted 7068 aluminum body resulting in a beautiful laid-back overall look.
On the inside, Numen also features a carefully designed transition between ring and cup. Aluminum and steel meet in the same beautiful way as on the outer profile rounding off the harmony-driven design concept.
7068 aluminum alloy allows for very thin material thickness down to (or even below) one millimeter. However, the Numen does not go that route. We purposely left the cup walls well beyond this thickness to further strengthen the overall construction and make the Numen more resistant to drops and undesired hits. The massive rims still provide a lot of inertia and give the Numen its immense power and stability.
Aside from the crazy PYBIT, Numen is our widest yoyo to date. It offers the widest catch-zone of all ILYYs. Its concave gap profile is derived from the Golden Abyss and expanded even more to enable fingergrinds like never before. Hitting even the most daring tricks is made possible thanks to the forgiving shape. The rims flatten out to allow for a nice hand feel.
Most of our line-up featured a 4 millimeter gap. We consider this gap width enough for most tricks and situations. This gap width also allows for snappy and tight binds of the entire lifetime of the response pads. For the Numen we increased to gap to 4.5 millimeters for maximum string layer capability. The Numen’s flush pad design retains tight binds and overall reliable response of smaller gap width yoyos.
The Numen features shorter bearing seats to allow for tool-less bearing swaps and maintenance. This yoyo is supposed to be played, bearing maintenance should not take away more time than necessary from play. Numen will not require any tools or pliers to access the bearing.
With the Abyss line we delved into the word of fingerspin yoyos using concave cup design. Even though perfect centering is possible with this construction it comes with a few drawbacks. Concave cup designs do not force the finger into the cup center, only really steep shapes may do so which come with other compromises in terms of mass placement. In addition (depending on the center of the cup) concave profiles are less stable to disturbances while fingerspinning.
The Numen solves theses drawbacks by introducing a convex cup design that mimics the concave outer profile. This pushes the finger right into the center area and keeps it there all the time. This strong push to the center allows the Numen to have a more traditional central hub without any dimples, anti-cones etc. Perfect centering is simply not needed with the Numen thanks to its convex inner cup design.
To further increase stability during fingerspins, the central cup features a small step as the transition from the concave profile to the center. These features make the Numen the best fingerspinning yoyo we ever made. Hitting the cup will ensure fingerspins no matter what. The traditional central cup design allows the Numen to use longer axles resulting in longer threads improving their durability. In combination with the shorter seats, risk of stripped threads is reduced to a minimum.
The Numen is without a doubt the best yoyo we ever made. It does everything any ILYY can but it does it a lot better. Longest spins, highest stability, widest catch-zone, best fingerspins, strongest (finger)grinds, easiest maintenance. If you want ‘maximum everything’ from ILYY, the Numen is for you.
Initial Run
The initial run of the Numen was released in February 2024 and was limited to 42 pieces in a Bronze/Black colorway with a Soda Blast finish.
The following story was taken from ILYY’s website.
After exploring performance-oriented design aspects with the Numen we took a step back and thought about what we love most about yoyos and which elements capture the essence of fun.
Out came the Alpha.
Slightly undersized at 53mm, it is a quick and snappy player. The smaller diameter combined with the massive outer stainless steel rings enables Alpha to perform like a full size yoyo without the compromise of kickback during throws and binds. It is an agile player with higher RPM while still retaining powerful spin. We carefully tweaked inertia to land in this goldy-locks zone.
The overall shape inherits the best elements of other ILYYs:
The Numen’s gap profile unlocks monstrous fingergrinds and gets out of the way during horizontal tricks. At a modern 45 mm width paired with its wide catch-zone, Alpha takes care of those difficult to hit (horizontal) tricks. The 4.5 mm gap takes in all string layers tech tricks bring to the table.
In addition, it allows for Numen’s fingerspin-hungy convex inner cup design guaranteeing flawless fingerspins at any time. The beautiful rounded-off central spike adds crucial milimeters to the overall axle length yet does not pose any danger of hurting the player.
Structural integrity was also considered and the upped AL-wall thickness of the Numen was incorporated into the design. Deformation from floor-hits is reduced, Alpha will retain its smoothness longer.
Alpha features blasted and electroplated stainless steel rims for great spintimes and grinds. The slick surface effectively works against spin loss during accidental touches.
The ring-body-intersection again features our rounded-off design for a more aesthetic impression.
We modified the profile to improve on rejection tricks giving the string a distinct edge segment to snap over.
The inner cup extends beneath the entire ring and finds its conclusion in an IRG lip allowing for amazing thumbgrinds. The steel ring sits on a wide base further strengthening the overall integrity.
The Alpha is our take on a Jaqueline-of-all-trades yoyo. It can do it all, but in a fun and motivating way.
Initial Run
The initial run of the Alpha came out in October of 2025 and was 25 pieces in the Inferno colorway with a Soda Blast finish.
Shinnosuke has been a valuable part of our team for years, and embodies the style, creativity, and uniqueness that we put into our brand and our yoyos. It was obvious he was the perfect team member archetype and super deserving of a signature.
Nimbus has a nostalgic feel in the hand and during play that’s reminiscent of higher-end models from 2009-2011, offering a nimble, soft handling that feels both easy-going and controllable.. this combined with its modern performance lends itself to effortless movement during your tricks. Nimbus encourages a relaxed approach to yoyo play, allowing for a more enjoyable experience. The bimetal rings and weight distribution lends itself to Shinnosuke’s swift changes in direction and speed during his combos.
To foster even more creativity, four stickers are being included with each design to make each yoyo unique in its own right. Unfortunately these do cause vibe when applied, so use at your own risk.
This is also our first throw featuring our new ‘Cloud Blast’; a new lower grit, fluffy blast that will be featured on our main line throws from now on.
We hope that this yoyo brings you peace and joy whenever you throw it!”
“Back in March of 2022 following the success of the Emotion, Max over at @editionyoyo and @avery.gingie were begging for a bimetal version and I got to work.
I quickly realized through many attempts at a bimetal CAD that it would be near impossible to create without an odd aesthetic with the weight rings, major changes to specs, or a ridiculously heavy weight. The main concern here was losing that stepped lower rim in the cup of the design, which was a huge part of the Emotion’s overall aesthetic.
Eventually, I thought about creating the stepped rim aesthetic by using a different material. Thus Connection proto 1 was born. We created a sandwich between the Aluminum and Steel with a large plastic piece which simulated the stepped rim aesthetic in the cup of the Emotion, but allowed us to pack a lot of extra weight to the SS rim. The result was an aesthetically striking and classy design with a very unique complexity to it. This design had the same specs as the original Emotion, but was about 1 gram lighter.
This design did have some issues, specifically in playfeel and performance that ultimately outweighed how much we loved the aesthetic. Removing all of that inner rim/mid weight from replacing the aluminum with polycarbonate and placing it in the SS ring caused a huge amount of sluggishness or lag to the design during play. It moved well enough but felt like it needed a ton of input for it to move, so back to the drawing board I went.
How were we able to get more weight balanced across the rim to potentially fix this issue? With a lighter overall weight and an increase in diameter, but the real magic was from replacing the previously outer ring design with a more midship SS ring, this allowed us to spread the weight out more evenly across the rim, which effectively removes the sluggishness we felt in our first prototype.
This new prototype would eventually become the production model with the following specs:
55.8mm Diameter 46mm Width 64.8g Weight 4.5mm Gap 7075 AL + PC + SS
Lastly shout-out to @aapenn1 for our airplay engraving and Patreon member Brian Corliss for the clever name idea!”
