It’s hard putting yourself out there, especially when your expectations are high and it’s your field of expertise. You can get paralysed by the fact that you’ve seen it and done it all before but I think the point is that it’s never been done before in the way and context that you have done it. You create your own magic formula of graphics, typography, colour, material, detail, packaging, photography, promotion and of course your online shopping platform.

I hate the word perfectionist as everything evolves constantly. That’s life. That’s nature. Design solutions that are perceived as perfect one day will not be the next day. The challenge is to find a solution that will last and stand the test of time for as long as possible.

This third and final post about my journey to creating a hip urban apparel & decor brand I’m going to confess to some dead ends and errors of judgement whilst trying to come up with the *perfect* online shop.

I love online shopping! Hang on, let me clarify: I love online shopping on platforms that are a) easy to use b) have a simple, clean, modern interface without any nasty flashing adverts (yuk!) c) show the product properly, different angles, plain flat lay, zoom in and out and on person, d) give me a positive and smooth experience and last but not least define their brand and put it in context with a mood board, look book or blog.

Madewell, &otherstories and Zara are just some great examples and online shops I love to browse though my own online marketing budget was slightly lower. I researched WordPress themes for hours and finally settled on an interface that needed some design ‘tweaks’ only to bin it all (!) less than 3 weeks before the launch and opt for a shopify template instead. Argh… an impulsive, painful (and expensive) lesson to learn but oh so worth it looking at the finished site.

I’ve tried to give customers a smooth and easy shopping experience with the opportunity to delve deeper into the brand and what Wild Boys and Girls stands for. There’s a LOOK section where you can see what our little tribe got up to during the photoshoot with the lovely and talented Lorna Allan who has the most playful way with kids and managed to catch their energy perfectly on the day. And I’ve described in the ABOUT section who this little tribe is, what gets them excited, what makes them tick and what their favourite food is (clue, it starts with ‘i’ and ends in ‘cream’).

Most of all I hope you’ll like the product and join our tribe. Happy shopping!

 
MORE INFORMATION | Wild Boys and Girls
PHOTOGRAPHY | Annie Kruse
 
Follow Stylejuicer with Bloglovin

As a creative person designing for yourself is hard, really hard. Most creatives are their own worst critic and I’m no exception. It’s easy to get overwhelmed and procrastinate but the times I did get stuck I found it helped to just push on with other parts of the job researching production processes, suppliers and online shopping platforms. I may even have bought a thing (or twenty) online – all in the name of research obviously.

My inspiration mostly comes from visual clues but it also helps me to totally let go of the subject and concentrate on something completely different like meeting and chatting with friends, yoga, going for walks or just binging on Netflix. Somehow I’ve got this inner conviction that the *right* solution will come to me sooner or later which helps me to stay calm – well, most of the time at least. Experience has a lot to do with it and working as a graphic designer for the retail and service sector for the past 15 years has given me a good understanding of what’s involved. The challenge was to put it all into action for my own brand.

There were hundreds of permutations racing through my mind during the early months of the design process, most of which I could disregard after a quick sketch or mock up in illustrator but this mildly obsessive process has made me 100% confident about the designs, their quality and longevity. 

The hardest part was narrowing down the graphics as I found it hard to be objective about them after a while – I love(d) them all! So I did a very unscientific straw pull and asked some designer friends, potential stockists, instagrammers and business mammas for their opinion. Their feedback was invaluable and I have to mention Kim from Design+Life+Kids whose support was amazing and gave me reassurance that I was on the right track. She is now also our first stockist in the U.S. so if you’re based there head over to her shop for some WBG goodies. 

The logo design was something I worked on in parallel to the tshirt graphics. I already had a sense of how it had to feel, even smell and taste if you like. I wanted a logo mark that could be subtly incorporated or dissected into the graphics as an additional *hidden* clue to reward those who’d spot it. I just had to bring it to life visually and apply it to the additional marketing material and packaging.

 
MORE INFORMATION | Wild Boys and Girls
PHOTOGRAPHY | Annie Kruse
 
Follow Stylejuicer with Bloglovin

So, this is it! The shop is open for business and I’m unbelievably excited and just a little bit proud to invite you to have a browse on Wild Boys & Girls and check out our monochrome apparel and timeless graphics for your small fry and their dens, lairs, hideouts, bomb sites, bedrooms, playrooms and whatever else qualifies as their personal space.

Boy-o-boy it’s been an incredible project so far – exhausting and rewarding in equal measure – and to celebrate the opening this week I thought I’d write a little series of posts on here illustrating my journey towards creating a hip, urban kids brand.

So, let’s start with the foundation of every design project: a rock solid brief to rein in the imagination and remain focussed.

Like a lot of decisions in my life designing some hip tshirts for the small dudes was an impulsive one. Though in hindsight it must have been the culmination of endless hours browsing Pinterest and Instagram as well as reading about and meeting stylish and inspirational Mamas in business that finally triggered a passion and an urge that I couldn’t resist any longer. Once the idea entered my head I was hooked, I had to bring my own sense of style into it.

Not only did I want my kids to look cool in the playground but I wanted the tshirts to last. The designs needed to be timeless, the Jersey had to be soft and comfortable to wear, the cut had to be just right and they had to wash well in a kind of getting-better-with-time way. The sort of tshirt you hand down to younger siblings or pass on to other parents.

I wanted the graphics to be unisex and appeal equally to (wild) boys and (tomboy) girls and – in a totally narcissistic way – I wanted to be asked where I got them from when we were out and about. Not to forget that the branding had to be clever and stylish representing my own clean, simple and modern aesthetics.

Looking back this was pretty much the brief I gave myself. Though it was never written, never verbalised but instead instinctively absorbed and implied. Put into action with passion, enthusiasm, tenacity and a good portion of naivety, optimism and hope.

More on designing my first collection for Wild Boys & Girls, creating the brand and what helped me stay calm during the design process tomorrow. See you at the shop!
 

 
MORE INFORMATION | Wild Boys and Girls
PHOTOGRAPHY | Lorna Allan (photos 1-4), Caroline Jones (photos 5-8)
 
Follow Stylejuicer with Bloglovin