What do you get when you cross the best in baby furniture design from Ireland with one of the most loved nursery brands on the market? Why Bunny & Clyde x Mamas & Papas of course! We caught up with Bunny & Clyde co-founder Nathalie Vos to talk nursery design, creating heirlooms and collaborating with the high street.
Nathalie was first approached by Mamas & Papas at the Baby Show in London. “Mamas & Papas had just done their first collaboration with Liberty of London,” explains Nathalie. “Four months later I got a call from their Head of Design. It was a great feeling that such a large and well-respected company liked what we were doing, liked our aesthetic and the fact that we were doing something different to everyone else. That they wanted a little piece of what we are doing was such a great opportunity for us.”
Nathalie was given a brief to design a cot, a nursing chair and a dresser/ changer. The Bunny & Clyde collaborative collection sits at the higher end of the Mamas & Papas furniture range with the rocking chair costing €985, the convertible cot and toddler bed €985 and the dresser/ changer €735.
“Our own range of bespoke nursery furniture is handmade in solid walnut and ash by the wonderful David Crowley in Bunmahon in Co. Waterford, but the Mamas & Papas range is still built to last. It's made from birch plywood which is beautiful and has all the characteristics of solid wood whilst being easier to manufacture,” says Nathalie. “I was given complete free rein to design what I wanted and then worked with Mamas & Papas to tweak the designs to make them less costly to produce for the high street.”
With just 100 of each item of furniture being produced, the collection allows the aspirational customer to tap into the aesthetic of Bunny & Clyde without going down the bespoke route that the brand is synonymous with.
Working on the Mamas & Papas collection was a learning curve which has led Bunny & Clyde to consider the possibility of creating a diffusion range themselves: “With our premium range it is really nice not to have to make any compromises, to make exactly what we want, with the very best craftspeople, utilising the very best materials and also making to order so that our clients have the opportunity to customise their furniture－something that doesn’t really exist elsewhere in the market,” says Nathalie.
“What the Mamas & Papas collaboration has taught us is that there is an aspirational market out there. Creating something that has all of our principles of design and our brand ethos, but perhaps creating something which is simpler in terms of details or construction, is something we may consider in the future.”
