Shop love | Frankie and Frenchie

Today I want to share with you one of my latest online store finds – Frankie and Frenchie. I was searching for a new bedding for my two year old which would look nice to me and at the same time was fun enough to please my little one and I was lucky enough to stumble across Frankie and Frenchie and their gorgeous range of modern and playful kids bedding. In addition to modern minimalist Scandinavian style that I love so much, it’s also important to me that the textiles hugging my kid during those precious sleep hours wouldn’t contain any harmful substances. Fortunately, the bedding from Frankie and Frenchie fills this criteria as well – they use only GOTS certified organic cotton and water based ink to produce their textiles. Lovely designs combined with kid and eco friendly production – what else to look for? :)

Minnie and Dee, the girls behind Frankie and Frenchie, kindly agreed to answer some questions, so that we can have a peek behind the brand and get inspired by their story.

Tell us a little bit of your background.
We have known each other for more than 10 years and both reside in sunny Queensland, Australia. It was our similar interest in interiors, graphic design, fashion and all things pretty that brought us together to start Frankie and Frenchie. Since the business went online six months ago, it has been a crazy experience for us learning to juggle work, kids and family so it is no surprise when we say we sometimes are sleep deprived!

How you came to the idea to launch Frankie and Frenchie?
We both have allergy boys with eczema and we found it hard to source for organic bedding that was gentle on their skin but also cool enough to fit with our home interiors. A light bulb moment happened and like other businesses that started by identifying a gap in the market, we decided that with our background in interior design and marketing, we could fill that gap.

We sat down and put a few concepts down on paper and communicated what our philosophy was going to be. We both agreed that we wanted to stay ethical and support Australian businesses were we can. Hence Frankie & Frenchie is made from 100% GOTS certified organic cotton and printed using environmentally friendly water based ink. It is made and printed in Australia to reduce our carbon footprint.

How would you describe your style?
Our style would have to be modern minimalism with a dash of quirkiness. We try to incorporate fun into everything we do, because at the end of the day we are designing for kids.

Where do you find inspiration for your designs?
Anything and everything! We believe that inspiration begins with a space that is filled with the things we love. We love things like interiors, fashion, graphic design and the cityscape. We can find inspiration from tile patterns to colour combinations on the catwalk. The one thing we always ask ourselves when designing is “will this work in the boys room and does it reflect their personality?” So our boys are our biggest inspiration.

How do you balance work and family life?
We make sure that we have days just dedicated to spending time with our family where we do fun stuff like having picnics in the park, going to the museum or just spending quality time at home.

It does get hectic at times but at the end of the day family comes first! So we find ourselves working during odd hours of the night when the kids are in bed. Other working mums with business can empathise with us on that!

We also are constantly messaging each other about ideas when we see something of interest or how we can do something better. Our brains never switch off!

What is your advice to someone thinking about launching an (online) business but still in doubt?
Don’t let fear stop you from doing something that you have been dreaming about. If money is an issue, start small then build it up by connecting with your customers and the online community. So stop dreaming and start doing, sometimes when you think about things for too long it becomes overwhelming. You’ll learn from your mistakes along the way, we sure have!

Thank you Minnie and Dee for your time to share the story behind Frankie and Frenchie. Be sure to check out their stunning bedding collection and follow them on Facebook and Instagram for lovely monochrome kids world inspiration.

This post was brought to you in collaboration with Frankie and Frenchie. All photos used in this post are from their website.