When Lulabird designers and owners Rachel and Louise emailed me, I knew I had to share their uber cute children's designs with readers. Rachel and Louise are a really dedicated and talented duo, something you'll find out about when they talk about how they set up Lulabird. What I find really intriguing is their commitment to UK manufacturing. All their products are made here which really helps support local businesses and, as a double whammy bonus, they're all made from recyclable materials too.
Going into business for yourself can be a daunting thing and as someone who has been freelance for five years now herself, that's something I can really relate to, so I'm pleased Rachel and Louise have offered their thoughts on how to go about setting up in business too.
Ok, now that we've taken a little peek at their desks (above), let's talk to Rachel and Louise and take a look at some of their range.
What inspired you both to start Lulabird?
A few years back (when Lulabird was just a twinkle in our eye) we worked alongside each other in the creative department of a crazy busy marketing agency where the environment was incredibly fast paced and frantic. At the time we thrived on this pressured environment — until our children came along and hugely altered our lives and outlooks. We wanted to spend more time with our families, whilst still working to help preserve our sanity amidst our small rabble of toddlers!
We were keen to be involved in something we loved and were passionate about so with both of us being interiors obsessed, and with three young children between us, children’s interior products was the obvious answer. We had previously searched high and low for some unique and quirky items for our children's bedrooms being passionate about design, we found the high street offerings were just too predictable. With our combined creative skill set of design and marketing, the prospect of designing our own products was too tempting... hence Lulabird was born!
Did you have backgrounds in design or did you retrain in any way?
We both come from creative backgrounds; Louise is a graphic designer and digital illustrator and Rachel is a fine artist with a masters in marketing. However, the design we’re doing now is so different to the corporate design that we’d been involved in before. To design something our children love and that we really love, something that we’re happy to hang on our own walls is a real luxury... and great fun as well
How did you go about starting your business? Is it tough being a small business owner as we come through the recession?
Rather than see the recession as a hurdle, we took it as an opportunity to start slowly developing our brand at a time where the economy had (hopefully!) been through the worst and would (fingers crossed!) start to come out the other end. It was also important for us to remember that there are people out there who still have money in their pocket and are still spending it; especially on their children. We all like to spoil them!
We were juggling very young children when the Lulabird concept first evolved so the process of starting up the business was very gradual. We gave ourselves the luxury of plenty of time to umm and ahh about the products we could produce and to speak to as many people as we possibly could to find out about not only running a business but also what parents wanted in terms of children’s interior products, which of our design concepts they liked, what values were most important to them, etc.
It was really surprising and enlightening to see how much support there was out there for people starting up in business actually. Prior to starting up Lulabird we had no idea that all this help was out there and would advise anyone thinking about setting up a business to take advantage of this. Talking to people has been invaluable; if someone offers advice we take them up on it and if someone knows someone who can help us, we’ll make sure we talk to them. We did have to make sure we kept focusing on our original idea which was to create something unique and contemporary for children; this new opportunity for flexible working meant we are easily sidetracked; sewing projects, retro furniture and auction sale rooms often distracted us!
Your designs are very different from traditional children's products (cartoon characters etc). What made you decide to do something so different?
Coming from creative backgrounds, we are both obsessed with inspiring interiors, great design and anything else beautiful and we also love anything that has a handcrafted feel about it. We wanted the products that we bought for our children to reflect this love of interiors whilst also making sure the children loved it too... many children's products stick to the same mould of tractors, princesses, teddies etc. Lulabird moves children’s interiors away from these traditional and stereotypical designs and takes inspiration from current grown-up fashions and interior trends, whilst injecting colour, characters and personality into the products that children absolutely love!
I'm Camilla, a journalist, blogger, interiors addict, knitter, new-crocheter, cake eater, chocoholic and mum of three. Sometimes all at once.
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