The Oriental has medium size, the body is slender and long, yet with a very well developed muscle strength, which is quite firm in feeling. The legs are high (long) and slender with fine oval paws. The bones are fine and delicate.

The head builds a long wedge, which tapers to a fine muzzle. The nose is long and absolutely straight. The jaws are fine built. When the head is viewed in profile, a long straight line can be seen, which starts at the top of the head and continues straight to the tip of the nose. When the head is viewed from the front, the outer edges of the head build a long triangle.

The skull is rounded, in some organization the top shall be flat.
The neck is long, slender and graceful, thus emphasizing the elegant lines of this breed.
The eyes are almond in shape and slanted toward the base of the ears. Their color is green. This combination between the almond shape and the oblique placement of the eyes together with the wedge-shaped head with its straight lines is called oriental appearance of the breed.

The ears are large and wide at the base (i.e. one can look into the ears from the front). They complete the triangular shape of the head when continuing the outer lines of the head.

The coat is extremely short, very fine and lies sleek to the body. When you stroke the coat you get the feeling of pure silk.

The tail is very long, rather thin and tapers to its tip.

History

Already before World War II there existed black and blue Orientals in Germany.
In fact the Oriental exists already for a much longer time. The manuscript Cat-Book Poems, dated between 1350 and 1767 and written in Siam (Thailand), describes and displays, besides the royal cats with points, various native cats, which are black, black-white bicolor, brown, blue (also called gray) and silver shaded. The first cats imported from Thailand to England mostly were brown or blue. It was around 1920 that the British Siamese club decided to ban the solid colored cats from breeding Siamese.

The breed 'Oriental Shorthair' was created about 1950 in England, when Baroness von Ullmann (Roofspringer cattery) decided to create a new breed with short coat and solid colored. She used Russian Blue and Abyssinians, which she crossed into the Siamese to conserve the "foreign" body-type (long, slender and elegant), which is characteristic for the Siamese. Baroness von Ullmann was mainly interested in creating chocolate (chestnut brown) and lavender (=lilac) Oriental Shorthair.
Originally the Oriental breed was called Ebony for the black Oriental and Chestnut Foreign for the chocolate Oriental. The cats were registered by GCCF as Foreign Cats in 1958. The brown Orientals were renamed to Havana in 1970. These Havana were exported to the US, where the Havana of today was developed, heavier and more sturdy.
Quite soon the breeders also developed other colors, such as white blue-eyed cats of oriental type, which became well known as Foreign White.
In 1972 Peter Markstein and Vicky Markstein (Petmark cattery) visited England to buy some new Siamese. They were fascinated by the large color variety in the Orientals having the elegant type of the Siamese, and imported some Orientals to the USA. They suggested to CFA to recognize these cats as a new breed. CFA recognized the Oriental Shorthair in 1977 for championship, the Oriental Longhair followed in 1995.
Breeders have consequently assimilated the body structure to that of the Siamese by outcrosses to the Siamese.

Breeding and Genetics

The breeding rules are different in each organization, thus one should know the rules very well.

In CFA cross-breeding between Siamese and Oriental is permitted for the Oriental, but for the Siamese it is not permitted. A cat can be registered as Siamese only having 8 generations of Siamese, and only the 4 basic color (seal, blue, chocolate and lilac) are called Siamese. See CFA Rules for Registration, effective February 2007, Article II, Section 3.
That means, Siamese resulting from Orientals (carrying the Siamese-gene c^s) cannot be registered as Siamese.

In FIFe Oriental and Siamese are called sister breeds. That means, Siamese may also have Orientals in their pedigree, as it is a cross-breeding between related breeds. See FIFe Breeding and Registration Rules, issue 1/2007, 4.1 List of recognized breeds with recommended outcross.

These are only two examples, how much breeding rules may differ from each other.

Concerning the genetics, you may read in detail about it in the chapter Genetics, Gene C and Gene cb & cs. You will also find examples from the breeding practice here.

Temperament

Oriental cats are talkative cats, they can get quite loud sometimes. Females, which are in heat, and lonely studs can cry with an ear splitting voice. The Oriental loves to communicate with her owner. They are active cats, who like to play. They like to jump quite high, but they keep their balance on the narrowest space with great elegance, thus disrupting or disturbing very seldom something.

These extremely intelligent cats make very good companions for people, who like to have constant companionship. The Oriental will follow you, wherever you go, if you sit down, it will sit on your lap, if you eat, it will sit besides you on the chair, without being demanding or begging for food, if go to bed, it will enjoy to sleep in your bed with you. Orientals will be your friends for a life time.

Grooming

Orientals require little grooming. Rubbing their coat with chamois skins will remove dead hears and will produce a silk-like glistening coat.