Papo d'Anjo and Oscar de La Renta

Last Autumn, I received an email from the founder of Papo d'Anjo, Catherine Monteiro de Barros, saying that she was moving on and Papo d'Anjo would cease to exist. This was particularly sad to me because it was a wonderful very high-end, extremely good quality line of children's clothing made in Portugal (all throughout the 17 years that was in existence). Catherine is a British designer married to a Portuguese and she started Papo in England in the 1990's. It was sold exclusively at Harrod's - and eventually spread to the USA, selling at Bergdorf Goodman's and through exclusive trunk shows.

I knew of Papo long before I had my daughter, and then was lucky enough to attend a few of the trunk shows. Their blog is still up and there you can see some of their wonderful clothing. However, the news was not all bad. Catherine was moving on... to design a brand new line, also of children's clothing, for Oscar de La Renta (who I have been fortunate enough to have met a couple of times).

The even better news is that the break is seamless (pun intended?) - the clothing is still made in Portugal, of the wonderful quality that was expected with Papo d'Anjo - and the design still very clearly along the the same lines. And for those of us who used to love the trunk shows... they shall continue as well!

Atelier Mariazinha

As I browsed on Facebook all the boutiques that I follow through my page, I thought I would share with you my favourite children clothing and accessories labels, as a regular feature.

You will notice that most of them happen to be European, mostly Portuguese - this is not just a way of promoting Portuguese labels - which I would of course, being Portuguese myself ;-)  - but also because I believe in well-made products, especially if they are beautifully made!

Some time ago I  mentioned Mariadelina, a beautiful boutique in Lisbon, which carries their own brand (made right there in their workshop) and other brands, of clothing, accessories and even furniture. And before that I mentioned one of my all-time favourite boutiques, the Spanish Nanos. I visited their gorgeous shop in Notting Hill, London and could seriously have purchase the entire contents!

Today, I want to feature another boutique, Atelier Mariazinha. Also located in the heart of Lisbon, they sell the most wonderful children's clothing - and their website is absolutely adorable.

Make sure to visit their website and mostly, follow them on Facebook, where you can see more of their products and keep up with sales! ;-)

Thomas the Tank Engine

Our daughter loves trains (she gets that from daddy!) and for the longest time she loved everything Chuggington - we bought the books, the card games, the colouring books, and yes, the episodes (we watched the orginal British ones). And I wondered how long until she discovered Thomas the Tank Engine...

Well, the day came soon enough and we looked online for a few episodes, after we purchased and read one of the stories. Unfortunately, as most cartoons these days, the re-made versions are awful! Eentually we found (only) a handful of the late 80's British episodes on YouTube.

So imagine our delight when we found the DVD with the first ever Thomas episodes, for sale at Target (and they come with a little wooden Thomas)! :-) And in case you did not know - here's the added super-bonus to these episodes... they are narrated by Ring Starr!!

Mariadelina

During a quick visit to Lisbon, I discovered a wonderful baby boutique, Mariadelina.

The clothing is truly wonderful, with all special occasion dresses embroidered by hand. It is all manufactured right there in their Lisbon workshop.

And they carry a wonderful (Spanish made) line of furniture and decorative accents. I could not resist and asked to take a few photos of the things that caught my eye - it made me wish my toddler was still a baby!!

Edward Ardizzone RA

I am always on the look out for great prints to frame - I dream of all my walls completely filled with prints, floor to ceiling! Usually I prefer originals and the older the better (my oldest print is a XVIIIth century print of a ferret), but every now and then I cannot resist reproductions, even in the shape of a greeting card. 

While in London I visited the small but amazing shop owned by architect and designer Ben Pentreath. I love his work - he's a traditionalist - and I particularly love his English-ness (in case you had not noticed, I am an inveterate anglophile). His blog is my daily treat, feeding my love for English vintage and antique, art and architecture, books, country and city. You can read it here.

Among the many things I saw and wanted to carry home, I saw a couple of wonderful prints by Eward Ardizzone, perfect for a child's room. I guess I should have known about him, as he is an RA and I worked at the Royal Academy of Arts for quite a few years, but alas, I had not.

 

Ardizzone was an artist and a prolific children's books illustrator in the early to mid 1900's, worth reading about. There is a sweetness to his illustrations that I love. This time I went with the greeting card format and purchased a few to frame for my daughter's new bathroom - but I am already eying some of the vintage books on eBay!

The Queen's Knickers!

During an extremely short visit to London, we met up with a very good friend whom I had not seen in a long time. She has an adorable little girl who is ten days older than our daughter.

We gave her one of our favourite books, Make Way For Ducklings, by Robert McCloskey. Not only do we really love it, but we wanted her daughter to have a New England story!

As it turned out, she also had a wonderful gift for our girl - four small books from a great series, Red Fox Mini Treasures (a division of Random House UK). My daughter absolutely loved them - the stories, the illustrations and especially the fact that they fit perfectly in the new "pack-pack" we got for her in London!

But truly, her very favourite one (which we read and re-read several times, and even talked about when not reading it on the flights we took) was The Queen's Knickers, by Nicholas Allan... Seriously one of the best toddler books I have read! :-) Thank you Julia and Alice!

Le Petit Nicolas

While in Portugal, my daughter discovered a few great cartoons, all of them from a channel called Canal Panda! One of these cartoons was the dubbed version of a fantastic French original - Le Petit Nicolas.  

These episodes are based on a book series by René Goscinny and Jean-Jacques Sempé, written in the late 1950's and some were translated to English in the 60's. Amazon sells both versions.

There was also movie made in 2009, which we cannot wait to see!

Lastly, the cartoons were made in the past couple of years. They are so worth watching - and the music is catchy!! My daughter loves them so much that I am starting to wonder if watching all these French cartoons is really paying off and she is really understanding it all!