Interview with Zaza Couture childrenswear.

Q: What is the inspiration for your collections?

A: Fabrics are my inspiration, however, I have to say that fabrics in Paris fabric trade shows are getting less and less colourful. That is a problem, because we would like to find interesting ready to use fabrics, instead we have to make our colour palettes from which textile companies manufacture fabrics for us.   

Q: What is always your goal when you design and make children’s clothes?

A: To get the reacton when seeing the garment: “So beautiful!”

Q: What is the most difficult thing you come across daily?

A: To get the minimum of 300 metres per fabric roll and to find colourful fabrics. Also to find the right market. It helps that we are open since year 2002. so we have our known paths.

Q: How would you like to see your company/childrenswear industry in five years?

A: That depends on economic and political situation, because it is very unstable right now. It is not really possible to predict it further than one season ahead. 

[Online] Images available at: http://jamesgirone.com/spring2011/bestsellers/images/zaza_Peacock.jpg

http://www.kidsgazette.lv/images/lv/zimoli/Zaza/DSC_6302.jpg

Copyrights

    As a part of our designs are different prints. Not just self made, but seasonally we would use popular movie or toy images in our prints. For that I checked copyrights in companies like Disney, LEGO, Minecraft and more. 

A link to LEGO website and Fair play brochure:http://www.lego.com/en-gb/legal/legal-notice/fair-play

Logo designs

After brand logo review we got to a conclusion that it needs to be more Scandinavian less Native American. So I worked on couple of different designs. I thought of Scandinavian design and logo's. This is what I made at first. I simplified the design, but still kept feathers.  It still was not ready.

This logo I made completely Scandinavian style. Very simple and clear. Maybe it was too simple, at the end, our brand is a childrenswear brand. I used our inspiration in letters - spring/summer celebration flowers. 

We thought of an animal that we could use in our designs, that would be Scandinavian and also in other countries. We decided on deer or moose. This is my interpretation about deer/moose with flower crown in logo. 

Final designs! 

Lego children's wear.

As one of our main inspirations, LEGO have their own clothing line. We were inspired by LEGO concept by building things not their  clothes, but it is very interesting to see how they integrate their design in to fashion.

Here are some examples from Summer collection 2014. 

Image [online] Available from: http://www.wgsn.com.oaproxy.aub.ac.uk/content/search/#/children's%2520wear

[Accessed on January 29th 2015]

Logo's and names for our brand

    This week I worked on a logo and names for our brand. As our brand is based on products for children that would be adjustable and they could use their imagination, we came up with name Dream Big. It's easy to remember, short, fun and inspirational. We want our clients to feel like they can use our products and feel inspired. Also, just like the brand's name I wanted the logo to be fun and colourful.

Shop report from London

   This week we went to London to get some inspiration and see the latest trends. Our group goal was to take a look at clothing brands that make children's wear and toy stores for inspiration.
   First, we went to Disney store, which had a nice ambiance and it was easy to navigate in the shop. Also, we looked at the clothing they sell and seemed that most of the clothes was either a costumes or they had Disney character printed on. We knew that our products would not  fit in this store, because of it's policy to sell only Disney products.

After that we went to United Colors of Benetton store. I was very impressed with the range of products that brand offers for children and the materials they use. 

   What I liked about Hamley's store was the interaction with customers. They have thought about customers service and marketing very well. Not only, on every corner of the shop there is someone who is showing off the latest toy and interacting with customers of any age, there are stand's of toys for kids to interact themselves. As our product ( changeable and adjustable clothing for kids) is interactive, we thought that we could have a pop-up stand for kids to understand and try on our products. 

Finally, we went to Liberty's store and decided that it would be the best place to sell our children's wear. The shop had a great range of children's clothes and it was decorated well, making the shopping experience more fun for kids. 

Get ready, set up!

    So last couple of weeks me and four other of my group members have been working on starting up a new business as a part of our Global sourcing unit in university. I am chosen as a Brand strategist, which, I think, suits me well because I am interested in branding and fashion marketing. We decided to go for a kids wear route, even tough only one member in our group have worked with kids wear before. We thought that it is a different opportunity for the rest of us and I usually like trying out new specialisms to work in.
     We came up with kids wear that kids and parents could play with. How? By changing sleeves, pockets, collar, cuffs and more. In that way becoming stylists themselves. We would offer different prints, colours, patterns and shapes for chosen garment. Removable pieces could expand garments life much longer. We started our idea from "LEGO" as a "build your own.."  piece. 
    Currently working on our designs and brand name, and logo. 
  

PHOTO[online]Available from: https://blog.etsy.com/en/files/2011/07/cluedo_merletti-2-1.jpg