Oliver Jeffers - author, illustrator at Colette, Paris

Oliver Jeffers’ first clothing line and collectibles recently launched at the iconic Parisian department store Colette. Inspired by his 2014 picture-book Once Upon an Alphabet, the pieces are animated by some of the memorable characters and visual elements of his work. Jeffers collaborated with a small network of his talented friends to get the project underway. The aim being to create a limited line of covetable not disposable objects.

Once Upon an Alphabet, is no ordinary alphabet book, ‘E’ is for how many elephants you can fit in an envelope ? ‘L’ is for Jack Strack the lumberjack who unfortunately keeps getting struck by lightning. A 100 times in fact, luckily for him he likes it. For Jeffers the book is an amalgamation of 26 sketches that independently wouldn’t have worked as full picture books, but when combined they create a whole.

The Irish-bred, and now Brooklyn-based artist is committed to ethical manufacturing. The T-shirts and sweatshirts are largely inspired by his signature typography, using the 26 letters from A to Z as building blocks of all the stories we tell. The products are neither directed at adults or children but leave the decision to the consumer. There are very cute porcelain mugs, one smiling and one a little less cheerful bringing to life the story of a cup who falls from the cabinet. Jeffers will donate a portion of the sales from the line to the International Rescue Committee.

Go see Oliver Jeffers giant Octopus friend and his new collection at Colette, 213 rue Saint-Honore, or if that’s a little out of your way explore the whole range online colette.com and ojstuff.com.

See more of our favourites from Oliver Jeffers:

• Lost and Found
• The Heuys in it wasn’t me 
• The Day the Crayons Quit  – An absolute favourite in our house. I’ve lost count how many times I’ve read The Day The Crayons Quit to our children. I always put in my best reading performance by far, really putting the work in with each coloured crayon giving them their own unique accent and tone. Funnily enough a lot are New Yorkers. The beige crayon usually has the girls howling with laughter, a great reward for any tired parent at the end of the day !