diff --git a/perl/lib/Data/MessagePack.pm b/perl/lib/Data/MessagePack.pm
index 4a1da179..65c4bedf 100644
--- a/perl/lib/Data/MessagePack.pm
+++ b/perl/lib/Data/MessagePack.pm
@@ -33,6 +33,14 @@ if ( !__PACKAGE__->can('pack') ) { # this idea comes from Text::Xslate
     }
 }
 
+sub new {
+    my($class) = @_;
+    return bless {}, $class;
+}
+
+sub encode; *encode = __PACKAGE__->can('pack');
+sub decode; *decode = __PACKAGE__->can('unpack');
+
 1;
 __END__
 
diff --git a/perl/t/18_new_interface.t b/perl/t/18_new_interface.t
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..8867d208
--- /dev/null
+++ b/perl/t/18_new_interface.t
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+#!perl
+use strict;
+use warnings;
+
+use Test::More;
+
+use Data::MessagePack;
+
+my $mp = Data::MessagePack->new();
+
+is_deeply $mp->decode( $mp->encode(\%ENV) ), \%ENV;
+
+
+done_testing;
+