Laia Aguilar - The Animals Observatory SS16

THE MANIFESTO TAO

1.

We will celebrate the beauty of

the passage of time through things.

2.

We will be honest like animals and clever like children.

3.

Every morning, as we open the wardrobe, we will sing old songs for a new world.

4.

We will follow our instinct to the Northern Lights.

5.

Love above all. Equality above all. Kindness above all.

6.

We will play hide and seek with the stupid and the selfish. And they’ll never find us.

7.

We will light candles with kisses and look each other in the eyes.

8.

We will not respect museums that don’t tell the truth.

9.

We will reject any wool that’s scratchy.

10.

We will do things with passion, complete passion and nothing but passion.

You probably notice that I hardly ever talk about fashion for children on my blog, but there is a new born kids’ fashion label, which can’t just past away not noticed out here. It’s like a fresh breeze from Spain I’m glad to enjoy. Laia Aguilar is a former founder and creative director of Bobo Choses , where she was working from 2008 to 2014. Few days ago she officially launched her first SS16 clothing collection for children from 0 to 12 called The Animals Observatory. If I can be honest with you, when I saw today the family house of Laila on Thesocialitefamily blog I started to put the puzzles in places and like the whole story even more. 

As Laia said about her collection : “ The Animals Observatory " aims to be the clothing brand of our children’s children. Timeless in trends that really have nothing to do with fashion, it’s about being close to little family stories. The central influence on my designs for The Animals Observatory is perhaps the animal world seen through the eyes of a child, with curiosity, empathy and excitement.” 

Do I need to explain more? I absolutely love her style and that she can stay close to her instincts and feelings and create such a fresh and original collection. I wish the new born TAO a great success! 

Monday inspiration - green wall in children’s rooms

I think the green trend is here to stay and I absolutely love it. Adding natural greenery, plants and flowers to the interior gives it texture and fresh atmosphere….but what do you think about a green coloured wall ? My absolutely favourite walls are grey but maybe it is time to try something new? Personally I found green one of the most difficult colours to adapt in an interior, but this dark tones, are looking very interesting and deep. 

I found for you few great example of green walls in a children’s space. Two of them are with  wallpapers, which are very playful and catch the eye.  I’m sure my 5 years old would love this  “ jungle” vibe in his space with a plenty of dinosaurs to play. Green goes so well with white and wood furniture , which might be my favourite combination for children’s space at the moment. 

If you need some inspiration how to add natural plants into your home, 

please check Rafa-kids Pinterest:  Greenery at Home. 

Thank you for the inspiration : 

picture 1 / 2-3 - Maaike Koster / 4-5 Tellkiddo / 

6-7  Insideout magazine- styling Phoebe McEvoy photo Sam Mcadam-Cooper

favorite stylist part 5 - Kim van Rossenberg

It is finally Friday and I can relax and do something I really like….look for inspirations for my blog. 

You asked me where I take my inspiration from. There are many different ways I get inspired, so let’s start with the first one. Favourite stylists, yes, I follow them on INSTAGRAM, Pinterest and I look for their latest work in magazines and books. Today I would like to show you work of Kim van Rossenberg, who I came across in the Dutch VTwonen magazine. She really likes to work with natural materials and colours, and is a big fun of DIY. What always catches my eye and what I like the most about her style, is that she tries to bring some new ideas and show products in a fresh way. Look at the ladder , which she used in a children room. What a great way to divide a room in a transparent way, child can climb on it, but also hang favourite toys and garment. And do you like the big wardrobe painted half dark and half white, exactly the same as the wall? Such a brilliant idea, to soft the look of such a dominant furniture in a room.  It doesn’t take so much attention anymore and look just so nicely as a part of the child’s room. 

Looking at other stylist’s work, doesn’t mean I wan’t to do exactly the same thing of course, but it gives me sort of fresh wind and inspires me to also try my own ideas and to experiment. 

Thank you Kim for your great inspiration! Kim van Rossenberg on Instagram. 

Pictures via: vtwonen 

Hereby my older posts with other stylist work which I admire and follow: 

part 4  - Jessica Hanson / part 3 - Hans Blomquist  / 

part 2 - Jenni Juurinen /  part 1- Susana Vento 

new WHITE at Rafa-kids

Let’s start a new year in white, clean and stylish way. 

Do you feel a new energy to organise your space, to clean it and make things work better? 

I definitely do. 

Please welcome our Rafa-kids furniture in pure white finish. Last year we introduced R toddler bed - limited edition in this colour and it was a big success. Many of our customers asked for it and that’s why we decided to gave it a try! They were so right.  The new white collection is absolutely stunning. 

F bunk bed with the A teen bed in pure white finish, is a perfect furniture set for a modern space. We designed it for children which share a single room. The younger child ( from 6 years)  can enjoy his bunk bed and the older one ( from 8 years) can have the slick A teen bed . These two beds are in adult size and can be used for many years in different configurations.  

Let’s welcome this stunning WHITE pieces into our children’s rooms.

2016

Welcome in New Year.

A new start…light and blank space in front of us, which feels like beautiful welcome for new ideas and challenges. I really like this time of the year, 

because it’s so easy to believe that all the new and good things are so close to my reach 

and that’s all I want is possible. Do you feel that too ?  

Making plans for 2016 makes me so exited. If you wrote my blog post: living-in-old-school 

you probably know, I’m looking for a new home for our family. In January 2016, we will know for sure if the place we found can be ours, and we believe this will be a start of a new journey for us. 

This year will bring us into our 40ties and we wish to celebrate it with an exotic trip…

but for now, I can’t tell you any more. 

There are many new ideas and plans for Rafa-kids brand in 2016. 
New furniture which we already working on and some exited collaborations.  Oh yes! We also hope to welcome a new people into our creative team.  Yes - look for a sign - we are hiring very soon.  

Rafa-kids stock will grow substantially and we’ve already made some logistics improvements, which will hopefully give us more space for creative work and to be with you! 

I can’t wait to start the journey! 

pictures 1/2 

Rafa-kids - year 2015 - thank you

The year 2015 is going to end soon.  

Would you like to look back with us and see some of  Rafa-kids’ favourite moments?

After a great success of our K desk in natural finish in 2014 we decided to introduce whitewash and black finish.  In January we got the first models and   Paulina Arcklin photographer and stylist made new pictures in her amazing home in Amsterdam. 

Two of Rafa-kids K desks were selected by one of our favourite Australian stylist Jessica Hanson 

for a photoshoot for InsideOut magazine. How great is that?  We were over the moon to see this colourful room created by Jessica and photographed by Sam McAdam-Cooper.

Spring came to us blossoming our long relation with a Japanese partner actus-interior store. 

After 2 years of preparations, tests , meeting and discussions , 

the first container was taken and sailed to Tokyo. 

Actus decided to extend their well known interior design collection with children’s design furniture. 

Rafa-kids was one of the designers selected for the ‘Debute’. 

We could not be more happy to have such a professional and  trustworthy partner 

on the other site of the world. 

Yes, we are very proud. 

We planned for a long time to have little online book with our range. 

In 2015 it finally happened - FIRST Rafa-kids ONLINE CATALOGE.

Graphics designer Asia Gwis took it into her hands and the final effect is just so beautiful. Asia created for the first issue also a new animals that we called Rafa-kids friends : a Bear, a Fox and an Armadillo. We are taking them with us into 2016 - wait for more news! 

Rafa-kids studio is a very busy place with frequently changing scenery.  

Creating new rooms with our furniture to inspire our customers is Rafa-kids speciality.  

This photo session with R toddler bed in dark finish and industrial touch, was made for na American magazine Lapetitemag.  Paulina Arcklin was so kind to come over and help us. 

It was difficult to choose just one room that we created last year! 

After the summer holiday we started to prepare for Maison&Object fair in Paris. 

For the first time we had the opportunity to show all our collection to the public. 

The exhibition took a place in September with 3.000 exhibitors and 80.000 visitors. 

These five days was such an amazing experience for us. You can read more about it here. 

At the Maison&Object fair in Paris we launched Rafa-kids NEW SHELVES collection. 

This time we worked not only with plywood but also added metal elements , 

which are going to be later available in 3 different colours. 

The shelves are a perfect addition to our beds and desk with a new function for storage and display. The new shelves are still in production faze and planned to be in stock at the end of January 2016. 

NEW SHELVES collection, which includes : 

S shelf

 M shelf 

 L shelf and XL shelf .

Rafa-kids is growing very fast, sometimes we have a feeling that we can not catch up with this high speed train. Of course we look back and would like to remember all the good things, but there are also low points. After 3 years, we are about to set a few very important decisions, which will help us to make our work more efficient and find a better balance in our family life and own business. 

We hope you will stay with us and enjoy this journey. 

Rafa-kids would like to thank this year especially : 

ACTUS -interior store for support and great partnership. 

Jacinda Malloy from Hide&Sleep for trust and promoting Rafa-kids in Australia. 

We can’t wait to see more of your projects in the near future. 

Paulina Arcklin photographer and stylist for leading and endless inspiration. 

Last but not the least we would like to thank all our customers 

for their trust and support and getting part of Rafa-kids into their lifes. 

We are ready to bring you so much more! 

If you would like to see other Rafa-kids years here they are :  2014 and 2013