Cath Kidston heads to Moominvalley!
Introducing Cath Kidston’s latest collaboration; a hand-painted British twist on the Finnish classic, Moomins, in a solstice-sunset palette for an uplifting collection across bags, home and kids.
Amidst a solstice-sunset palette of glowing corals, dusk-rich oranges and rosy pinks, at Cath Kidston this summer, we’ve dreamt and drawn our way to Moominvalley, for a collaboration that celebrates showing kindness, being nurtured by nature and embracing the beauty in individuality.
Moomintroll, Snorkmaiden and even Little My have been embraced with two of the brand’s most-loved heritage prints, ‘Linen Sprig’ and ‘Mushrooms’, hand-painted to add a British twist to this Finnish classic. Step into our blended world of imagination with Cath Kidston print designer Emma Szenasi-Holland, as she takes us behind the scenes of the latest collaboration with Moomins.
When it comes to collaborations between two iconic brands, where do you start? And how do you get the balance right?
As a team, we love to brainstorm and research into the collaboration we are working on—it’s always great to know the history behind the brand you are working with. This helps us decide how to fuse the two brands together. I remember we sat and watched old Moomin cartoons together as a team, it was so fun!
Moomin is iconically Scandinavian, how did you go about putting a British twist on such a Finnish classic?
We wanted to bring in some classic Cath Kidston elements into the designs, we decided to incorporate our heritage sprig roses and mushrooms, we felt these were iconic to Cath but also fitted in so well with the Moomin characters.
What was it about the Moomin stories that you felt aligned with our brand heritage and values?
We wanted to focus on the fact the Moomins love nature and are often found exploring outside. This feels very aligned to the Cath Kidston brand as we often take inspiration from nature and its beauty. We also loved the themes of kindness, supporting and nurturing those in your circle and really rooting for the underdog.
How did the characters, story and illustrations inspire the prints?
The colour palette was inspired by the beautiful backdrops you see in the Moomin cartoons. The Moomin illustrations have a really magical and colourful feel to them and we wanted to bring this magic into our colour palette. It’s always so important to capture the key characters into collaboration prints, and often the Moomin characters are found exploring together—with our Scenic print we wanted to create a sense of exploration and happiness. The collection also launches late summer, around the summer solstice, so we wanted to capture that rich sunset palette that feels so dreamy.
Our hero print features Linen Sprig from way back in our archive, what made you go for those?
As a team we all love Linen sprig—its such a lovely chubby bold ditsy! As soon as we combined this print with the Moomin characters, it just worked!
What techniques were used to design the print?
First, we did a lot of research and brainstorming around what prints we should use to suit the Moomin brand. The first print we created was the scenic print, we then created the Linen Sprig Ditsy to sit with this. Lots of drawing and layering was done to create the final prints.
What is your favourite part about creating prints to collaborate Cath Kidston with such an iconic series of characters?
I love the challenge of fusing the two brands together—I also love getting to know another brands history! Its always so exciting seeing the printed fabric and products.
Once the prints were created, how did you decide what products to feature them on? Tell us a little more about this process.
We work as a wider team at Cath to make sure we have the right products in the range. We look at customer feedback, classic shapes that always do well, as well as pieces that really fit the story of the collaboration. Then we work as a creative team to ensure that the print really marries the product. We work tirelessly on placement, we want every piece we make at Cath to feel like a little work of art.
What product is at the top of your wishlist once the collection has launched?
I really want the placement Moomin tote—it’s such a good size and the placement is very sweet!
The beautiful florals within the print feature over the campaign images, tell us a little more about the shoot process and this design?
We wanted our campaign imagery to bridge fantasy and reality. To merge the worlds of the Moomin valley that largely exists within the pages of the story books and cartoons we were inspired by, and our tangible product for this collaboration. We painted these loose, bold, big scale version of our ditsy florals, the same flowers we feature in the prints, which we then overlaid onto the finished images—it’s like the girl reads the stories, then imagines the story coming to life in a beautiful way. Our design team are avid readers and we are constantly referencing literature and stories as inspirations and guides for our work (and lives)—this shoot sought to illustrate this influence in a light hearted and fun way.
Cath Kidston x Moomin is available in-stores soon. Pre-order now and WhatsApp Cath Kidston 1 Utama (012-7726602) or Cath Kidston Bangsar Village II (03-22879381)