Customer Spotlight: Bear & Moo - Designs for Cloth Diapers

Ever since I started the business in 2011 Little Smilemakers Studio has been working for cloth nappy brands all over the globe. This industry has been growing and more parents are choosing a more sustainable way of diapering. And a big plus: they are a lot cuter than disposable ones! The first brand we worked for was Milovia, for which we also did some branding. After Milovia we worked on a completely new print identity for Bambino Mio. And after all these years we are still creating designs for cloth diapers.  

For 6 years we've been making designs for Bear & Moo. We started working with Hannah back in early 2019. And as the global market got greener and more conscious. Bear & Moo became the award-winning nappy brand and every won the business of the year award. They became trailblazers creating baby products for the concious parent. How cool is that? We are so grateful to work together with many talented ladies who are truly making a difference. And as you can imagine we are beyond excited to have them on our list of clients.

This spring Hannah selected another bunch of our designs. Our green puppies & neutral hearts are now launched and part of they nappy & baby accessory collection. You can find these prints on cute bibs, wet bags and even re-usable sanitary pads I wish they sold on our Dutch market! We proudly present you the new products here on our blog.

Hannah licensed our designs non-eclusively but she does have an extended license with exclusivity to her branch. With the Premium license you can use our ready-made designs and keep them unique to your company without breaking the bank. Need some prints for your products too? You can find more info about using our designs and our licensing options on our website.

Finished work: Days of Gold - Day Care in the Woods - Logo Design

Rainbows & Sprinkles has been one of our long term clients. We created hundreds of prints for Lucy’s sportswear brand. Last year we created a logo for her basic line of sports pieces before she decided to change course and sell her business. While creating designs we discussed our mutual love for animals and her biggest dream was to be surrounded by animals all day. In the summer of 2023 she found a large plot of land with stables, horses, right up the hills and surrounded with woods. She decided to change everything and start a Day Care. A place to grow up and play surrounded by nature and animals. 

We were so sad to see her leave Rainbows and Sprinkles, but she’s such an inspiration. She turned her life around and has worked on opening up her day care for months. For her new business we created a brand new logo design reflecting the surroundings of her new Nature day care: Days of Gold. We created some really crisp clean cut designs, freehand logo’s and some designs with badges reminding us of the scouts. Did you join them when you were a kid?

As a kid I grew up in the country side with lots of space to play. Take care of animals, build bridges over streams and little huts. So this logo was a fun piece to create. Something I could personally relate to. Here we’ll explain the logo designing process, so you can have a little insight on how we work. In case you need something for your branding swell.

Step 1: The Business Before we start we want to know everything about the business. Is it already ‘out there’ as an established brand? What are the core values. Some insight about the philosophy is key to create something that really connects. A logo should reflect your brand in a flash. What makes you different than others in your branch. We ask all the questions before even making a quote. For Days of Gold it was a smooth process since we know Lucy personally. This step was quickly taken. But most people we create logo’s for need some time figuring this out first. And we are happy to guide and assist when you still need to find out your business identity. It’s all part of the branding.

Step 2: Who’s your customer For Days of Gold we knew it would not be attracting the usual parent. Playing outside in the mud all day is a little different than your usual day care. Knowing your customer is really important. You have to understand what it is they’re looking for and what connects them to your brand.

Step 3: The Quote We have several packages for logo design and branding. Some of our customers just look for a catchy visual that sticks. Some want the whole shebang with a website and all the graphic elements attached to branding. This particular job was reduced to a logo design only to start with.

Step 4: The Design process When we have a clear agreement and laid down the basics above we start the design process. Usually this starts with a brainstorm and a free sketch routine in which shapes, notes and illustrations are put down on paper. For some designs we create everything by hand on paper. So did we for the first drafts. From there we translate those sketched onto the computed and create new vector sketches in Adorable Illustrator. For every logo design process we create a minimum of 3 design options, and branding directions, to choose from.

Step 5: The first presentation In our first presentation we put all sketches we made and create a story on how the design was developed. And how it involved during the process. Resulting into three proposals that are ready to use. We create some mock-ups and color versions for each proposal and explain why we made certain design decisions. Because it’s not all drawing. A logo design has an entire philosophy attached that will lift up your business. And normally you can’t see that in a blink. So we create a little guidance so a design makes sense for everyone.

Step 6: An hour of tweaks In our pricing we include an hour of changes after the first presentation. Usually it only takes some small tweaks. For Lucy, it was almost an immediate go on the first draft. She chose the circular logo. Easy to use as a badge on clothing and versatile. the premises also has a glamping on it, so with this shape we could also expand to logo versions per business. For this project we didn’t even need that extra hours but for some projects we need some more time to tweak and adjust.

Step 7: Payment In case you haven’t worked with us before. We never send out any finished artwork before we get paid. After we receive our payment in full we wrap things up.

Step 8: Finishing Up The last step is creating files that are workable for our clients. We have clients that need different types of files and versions. We all include those. Logo files for web. Logo files in high resolution for print. And Pantone colors. If you work on an entire branding project with us this is the moment we can go further and talk website & graphic items.

Need a logo for your new start-up or project? Or does your business need a re-vamp? We would love to take on your branding. Check our website for more info & rates. You can contact us there directly by filling out the contact form.

The Lookbook: The Cozy Winter Collection - New Trends Fabric Collection & Surface Designs

Every summer we work on new Christmas & Seasonal designs. They’re always planned 6 months ahead of time so our customers have enough time to license designs and plan their production. This year we didn’t make just one collection but three Christmas collections. The Cozy Winter collection is created for our younger audience. It’s a mix of whimsical winter elements, animals, and botanicals. 

Typical Christmas & Winter themes are covered again this year and for this Cozy collection we selected a neutral palette with a pop of lilac and a hint of vintage. Lilac has been the trending color of the year. And it matches the red and greens of the more traditional palette very wel. The more orange and rust colors give the collection a touch of Seventies. Terracotta is here to stay a little longer too.

We’d love to see these prints being licensed. And can’t wait who’s first to license one of these prints. Pattern designs are now available for single use or, if you’d like to launch a consistent batch of products, you can also license the entire collection at once.

New in the licensing business?
If you own a company and need print designs for your products you can license our designs. Licensing will get you the rights to our artwork to produce your own products and use our print designs. Licensing starts at €124.

We’ve also put some more info about licensing on our blog earlier this year, so if you’d like to read more about that and check out if licensing could be something for you read the blog post. We made an easy step-by-step about what you need to keep in mind before licensing print designs. You can also visit our website for more info or send us an email and we’ll find an A to your Q. All prints shown here are available for licensing. And they are all available on fabric in our Spoonflower shop too!


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Made with Little Smilemakers Studio Fabric // April 2016

It is so exciting to see a finished project after working hard on a new collection or a series of illustrations for our clients. But with finished fabric designs it is even a bigger surprise to see what customers create. To see how final products evolve when people put their own creative energy in there is amazing.

If you browse around on Etsy for some kids fashion you are very likely to stumble upon some Little Smilemakers prints. Most creatives with small home based businesses sell their projects via internet and tag us via Instagram. So we see some amazing things in our feed every month. We love how Little Smilemakers creations are the foundation for other creatives all around the world to work with. So here is our monthly blog post that features some creative results from the USA, UK, France and Poland. This month we selected a whole bunch of adventurous boys themes. Take a look and see if there is something for your little one too. This is our top 5 for April.

Hen House Apparel
Nicole is a mother of two boys living in sunny California who runs a small etsy shop with organic materials and unique prints. You can find a small selection of our designs in her shop, mermaids, guitars, polar bears and our cool umbrella rain design. With our umbrella print she has made some cute boys leggings and these are also available in her shop in different sizes. Take a look and enjoy her fun collection of leggings, shorts, head bands and more.

Sew Kuddly
A few weeks ago some cute lions popped up in our Instagram feed. Jasmin is based in Hertfordshire, UK and handmakes boys and girls clothing using cute, fun and trendy patterns. For this months 'made with' we selected her adorable lion leggings, one of our favorite designs exclusively made for Hemmers/Itex Germany. Jasmin also has some of our other baby animals in her shop. Curious? Take a look and get your little one a pair of these!



Madkouch
We have been working with Morgane for a little while now. Morgane is the driving force behind
Madkouch Boutik a colorful French webshop for kids clothing. She had licensed our tropical tucan, hot air balloons and inky texture cactus design. For this post we selected this cute cactus baby romper from the boys western collection. This cactus fabric is also available as harem pants, leggings, shirt and for adventurous girls: there is also a dress available! If you are looking for girls clothes, do check out the tropical toucan collection. We are so in love with this range too! Take a look into her shop, and check out all products.

Baby & Mother Poland
One of our favorite prints is our our dino palm tree design. A while ago we licensed this design to a company in Poland that has a whole bunch of Little Smilemakers designs available on fabric. if you are located in Eastern Europe this is a great shop to score some of our original design per meter. Take a look!

RoJo Apparel
Rose started her shop because she was having a hard time finding stylish things for her son Joshua (such a beautiful name!). She started out making bow ties but soon expanded her Etsy shop with clothing. For this monthly 'made with' post we selected her geometric dino t-shirts. We just simply fell in love with these cute little boys and had to have her in this April feature. Take a look at her shop for some stylish boys and girls clothes.