Kyoto magic

It’s already Friday and it's time to relax….

our kids have 2 weeks off from school so it will be even slower time for us in the coming days.

I thought I will show you few pictures from our visit in Kyoto. It was a short trip to this magic place and we feel we didn’t have enough of it. We biked through the city and it’s small streets. Stopping by some small studios producing ceramics, brushes or traditional indigo dying. Often we entered these small houses not knowing what to expect, and we loved that so much! We visited few temples, but they were so packed with people that we escaped from there very fast and took our own path…

Have a wonderful weekend. 

Rafa-kids at Actus Japan

Three years ago we welcomed in Rotterdam a very special team from ACTUS Interiors from Japan.

 Last Summer the first shipment of Rafa-kids beds arrived in that beautiful country 

and was welcomed into NEW KIDS COLLECTION of ACTUS. 

This Spring Rafa-kids finally had chance to discover the world of our partner 

on the other side of the globe. What a life time experience! 

To begin we broke ice having a fantastic evening filled with amazing Japanese dishes and drinks. Next day we were guided to some of the beautiful ACTUS stores in Tokyo (from around 50 in total). They all have a bit different atmosphere and are located in different areas of the city. ACTUS has many years of experience in importing furniture and unique vintage pieces from Europe. 

The kids world is new in their collection, so seeing Rafa-kids beds exposed at the prominent places in the shops made us so proud. After running around the busy Tokyo we finished the day with an Interview for Milk_Japon. Between much laughter, interesting questions and direct personal translations from English to Japanese, it was such a fun to do! 

In the evening, tired but exited we were ‘gathering’ at the ACTUS Slow House in Søholm. 

What a special space! It is outside the city, located within a SLOW HOUSE interior shop and fronted with the fantastic water view. We just wished the time to stop and let us enjoy that evening for longer…

Thank you so much ACTUS Interiors for having us around and welcoming Rafa-kids with such a hospitality and kindness. 

our Tokyo - first days in Shinjuku

We are back! It was a long break on the blog but I hope you are still here with us.

 I’m trying to catch up with work, so please be patient with me. I have so much to tell you! 

Today a taste of Shinjuku in Tokyo. If you can imagine that Tokyo is the world’s most populous metropolitan area with upwards of 37.8 million people and the world’s largest urban agglomeration … well, don’t be scared, it is very easy to navigate around. Wonderful subway system will take you anywhere in few minutes! Tokyo is one of the safest cities on earth with the most kind and helpful people I had ever chance to meet. 

We were so lucky with the cherry blossom. If you ever plan to go there in around this time of the year I would highly recommend to take your lunch to a park and sit together with locals. Enjoy this amazing moment in the hart of the crazy busy city. You will just relax, watch the beautiful nature and festive vibe around you. Such a wonderful experience.  We got our lunch ( Bento box) at the beautiful store ISETAN. The food department in the basement is an absolute heaven to walk around. 

We decided to focus on 3 districts in Tokyo which we wanted to get to know more. First days we stayed for business at Shinjuku, close to Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building. It is an office district with a lot of people waking in black suits but there are plenty of local restaurants and bars. At night you can just walk around the little streets and absolutely get lost in the mood, food and atmosphere…..

......to be continued

please wait here

it is time to go…..

Only one week left and Rafa-kids will fly to Japan. 

Did your read my post about it ?  we-are-going-to-japan

As you can imagine, we need to do a lot of preparations and this is a reason that there will silent on the blog…..but don’t worry. You can still find Rafa-kids on Instagram where I will be more present, also during our exciting trip. I hope to share with you all the beauty of Japan and interesting stories which are in front of us…..

Let’s stay in touch. 

photo credit 1/2

Cosy corner for siblings

Today we are crawling under Rafa-kids bunk bed ….

 it’s a cosy and comfortable little corner for a little girl or two girls sharing a room …

or friends coming over to play and sleep….try to imagine all the possibilities!  

If children share a single room, putting two - one persons’ beds in it, can be not an easy task if we do not have a lot of space. Rafa-kids thought about it.  That’s why we’ve created F & A beds. Each bed can be set apart in the room or put in different positions together. We have so much fun imagining this little corner with F&A beds in white, to show you how beautiful the sleeping - playing corner for children can be. 

Under the F bunk bed there is enough space to put a night shelf, or table, a few suitcases for personal belongings and little boxes for all the treasuries. We need them all, right?  Rafa-kids M shelf fits also perfectly next to the A teen bed. This will give an extra possibility to hang favourite jewellery, bag or softies, which your child would like to have around his/hers bed. 

Rafa-kids is known for a little yellow obsession, so that’s why you see

 it back in this cheerful and positive room.  We hope you like it as much as we do! 

Products on the pictures : 

F&A bed set Rafa-kids , storage baskets , Apple Pillow - grey , Umbrella bedding , 

S shelf and M shelf from Rafa-kids, Geometric pillows + rug - Ferm Living, Little Boxes - Hey. 

Child’s room metamorphose

It doesn’t happened often that two well know Sweden’s stylists take a challenge to redesign a child’s room. Don’t you think ? Pella Hedeby interior stylist and blogger at Stilinspiration and Frida Ramstedt who runs the most read interior design blog in the country - Trendenser, took the task. You can even see movie from the metamorphose here. 

I really like the moodbord Pella Hedeby created for this room. She choose white base and then played with some contrasting elements without loosing the texture and playful accents. Before the metamorphose the room was having very dominant stripe wallpaper on entire wall and one open space in the middle to play.  

Pella and Frida created three areas in the room :  sleeping area with the freshly painted grey bed, table with chairs and then teepee corner with toys to play and hide. The striped wallpaper was taken off  and all the important elements were putted lower and grouped together in one place. We forget sometimes that children’s hight is different than adults and they experience the room from a bit different perspective. One long shelf is created to put pictures, toys and favourite belongings. The colour palette is calm and cosy.  

I wish to see much more of such a nice room makeovers from stylists who normally do not work with kids deco. 

Ugo Rondinone Vocabulary of Solitude

We are so lucky. This amazing 45 clown sculptures came to Rotterdam, long way from Ugo Rondinone’s studio in NY! The other day I took my younger son Robert and we went to the museum of modern art Boijmans to see them up close . 

My son, wasn’t really sure how to behave….he was a bit scared but he was very intrigued…

” mom, are they real ? mom, are they dead ? can I touch them ? can I sit next to him ? “ 

I didn’t even want to say anything. I whispered, not knowing why. Their closed eyes asked for sort of magic silence. I love their amazing colourful costumes with glitter and contrasting socks , like they would like to get all our attention, even though I could feel their loneliness…

 If you plan to visit Rotterdam, the exhibition is open till 29 May. I highly recommend it.