Penguins, flowers, frogs, shamrocks, sailors and stars everywhere.
In sugar-sweet candy colors such as mint green, light blue, pink and also
printed with all those Jö motifs that you might come across when looking for pretty
baby and children's clothes. Finding something plain-colored is
hard enough, but if you ask for something black in a children's clothes store,
will be looked at as if they were asking for a shovel.
A shovel for digging graves. Because black is synonymous with
graveyard, with dreariness, death. A mourning color for children? Ugh spider!
In this country, the whole Pantone range of colors is projected onto children's clothes.
red is lively, yellow is cheerful, green is close to nature, white is innocent.
These are the codes of the children's wardrobe, and black has a place in it,
at least for us. So you have to wear black dresses either
dye them yourself or look for them in Asia. The reason for this is that Asians
do not associate black with sadness, but with strength. With the Japanese supplier
Uniqlo has been selling the most beautiful long-sleeved shirts for just under six dollars for years
for babies aged four months and over. They are unprinted, and the baby who wears one
toothless and laughing at you from the baby carriage looks adorable in it.
Scandinavian suppliers consistently use black
Because black is the most wonderful of all colors! This serious, austere, intellectual color - which, strictly speaking, is of course not a color at all. Black is a blessing and has long been so established in fashion circles that Emmanuelle Alt no longer makes a statement when she wears black. Because everyone wears black. And always. Black is the color of understatement and nonchalance. Big people can buy everything in black, and little people? Far too few, but - at least - not everyone misses out on the trend. Two large Swiss children's online stores, Zirkuss.com andStadtlandkind.chare working intensively with color. Patrizia Jaeger, co-founder of Zirkuss.comsays: "We see it as essential in a modern and creative wardrobe," says the mother of three sons. "Our labels such as Soft Gallery, April Shower and Popupshop produce great black looks." And: they are often the ones that sell out the quickest, says Jaeger.
What is particularly interesting, however, is that it is strikingly often Scandinavian suppliers who most consistently meet the need for black children's fashion. Soft Gallery and Popupshop come from Denmark, Mini Rodini comes from Sweden. Roberta Zingg, buyer and co-owner of Stadtlandkind.ch"Black is reassuring. We should let our children share in this beauty that we as adults take for granted," says Zingg. Anyone looking for a brand that is almost entirely dedicated to the color black will find it at Caroline Bosmans. "We immediately fell in love with the uncompromising presence of the color," she says. Incidentally, Bosmans is also Danish.
When asked by the two other Danish makers of Soft Gallery,
Tine Holt Moeller and Barbara Hvidt, who only show themselves in pictures.
themselves in all-black, Hvidt says: "Black has the same effect on the
most parents a bit serious." "And yet," she says, "it's allowed.
children can be serious sometimes too."
Martina Bortolani
