At Playtime Paris I had the pleasure of meeting Samantha Taylor, Designer of Unruly Blue – a gorgeous tailor-made clothing brand from the UK. During our interview, Samantha shared with me how she moved to England from the USA for a medical research position at Oxford University. Surrounded by the 800-year-old University, the British and vintage elements inspired her to launch a children’s brand which is in its 7th collection.
“In the beginning I went to Savile Row known for traditional bespoke tailoring for men and spoke with a lot of tailors, asking for tips on how to make a proper suit & jacket. Then I took all of those tips and made my first line.
One of the things that make Unruly Blue unique is that all of our collection is made in English Mills. We were told that we’re the only boys brand that makes a suit in England.”
We always try to include tailored details for children which some people think is ludicrous but we think they deserve just as much attention and care as adult clothing does. – Samantha Taylor – Designer, Unruly Blue.
“My mom was a designer so my entire life growing up I was surrounded by chic couture, with women running around my house getting dresses or trying on fittings. That was my entire world. So when I moved to Oxford for medical research it all just came together. I was inspired by my new surroundings and had this design history from my childhood. For my first collection, I asked my mom to come for 6 weeks to help make my first collection.”
“For Spring Summer 2015 I was thinking of a Nautical look. I had recently been to Boston and spent a lot of time there in on the Charles River where you see all those boats and sails. So I have the stripes and the boater jackets, lots of navy, sailor suits, and horn buttons. I’m still keeping it fun with the colorful lining and the light colors.”
“Also we’re really excited to launch our first Girls Spring Summer collection. We realized from our customers that there weren’t really great girls tweed riding jackets. Plus, when looking at so many gorgeous liberty fabrics I would think, wouldn’t this be perfect for a dress? So we decided to expand into girls.”
“I’m always inspired by liberty prints, I love the yellows and the florals, and their cotton is incredibly soft. We use loads of liberty prints and florals that we think aren’t only for girls, so we’re always making the boys shirts in liberty fabrics.
Also, what’s also unique about Unruly Blue is that we always like to have a fun liberty fabric lining for the kids. So we have a more traditional exterior look and put the fun little cotton in the lining so they can just enjoy wearing it. It’s a little surprise on the inside.”
“We also like to be sure that our clothing is functional. Aside from having cotton in the lining, we put silk in the sleeves.
For this collection we also wanted to offer a bit more casual pieces, so we made a series of tunic shirts that are more relaxed. We have the two button tunic shirt with a mandarin collar. And also another tunic shirt which is collarless. So we have a short sleeve on this one with a roll-up sleeve. So we just thought, more relaxed and feeling different.”
It’s a very tailored look but fun and different at the same time, and definitely very British inspired. We wanted to keep the tailored look but also have something a bit more chilled. So we made the linen suits that we thought were a bit different than our wool suits.
Unruly Blue sizes run from 4 to 14, but from the demand of this show, it looks like they’ll go down to size 2. So there will be cute little 2-year-olds wearing gorgeous little tailored Unruly Blue suits!
