Made out of soft, hand dyed and block-printed fabrics, Velveteen reinvents a repertoire of classic and sophisticated silhouettes for children up to 6 y old. Based in Hong Kong, this young brand launched in 2012 exhibited at Playtime New York last August is growing nicely.

The name comes from Velveteen Rabbit, a classic children’s story in the US and UK. The illustrations are award winning and the images stuck with Laura Eckerman Egloff. “This vision of classic childhood is what inspires Velveteen and I loved that it is also a type of textile as textiles are my key focus in design” says Laura .

Creative Director and Founder of Velveteen, Laura was born in Los Angeles California, studied at F.I.T. in New York,  Mount St. Mary’s and Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. She’s now living in Hong Kong with her husband and their 2 children aged 3 years and 1 year.
Velveteen

In her 20’s, Laura felt a strong need to leave her native California to move to Europe. She initially wanted to move to Paris but found a job opportunity in London and moved within 2 months of deciding to leave the US. In 2006 she was relocated by the same company to Hong Kong on a temporary basis but she met her husband  Markus who was also in Hong Kong on a temporary basis from Switzerland.

Velveteen

 

“I knew from an early age that I needed to be a designer” say Laura.”I graduated school with top honours and promptly set off to study design at FIT in NY – rather than the expected path of an ivy league university. My parents were both educators and, despite their reservations, were supportive of my following my dream”. After studying at FIT, Laura returned home to Los Angeles and fulfilled a promise to her parents to get a business degree. It’s taken her 15 years to extricate herself from the world of Corporate Finance and return to doing what she loves. “I feel as though I have such an amazing balance of creative passion and business knowledge that I guess I owe a debt of thanks to my parents!”. Wise words!

 Velveteen is  available at Petit Bazaar (Hong Kong), Eggy in Los Angeles, Lester Harry’s in Boston, Carousel New York and The Plaza Boutique in New York.

 

Laura

Laura Eckerman Egloff and daughter