Our company, Blue Platypus, was conceived in November, 2003. It has 3 main people: Heidi (President and designer), Scooter (vice president and assistant designer), and Big Dave, the financial wizard. We are based in sunny South Pasadena, California.

We are mid-century modernists at heart, although we find inspiration in various places. Our biggest inspiration is probably vintage furniture and clothing (mostly 1920s to 1970s). Furniture by Ray and Charles Eames, Eero Saarinen, and Heywood Wakefield heads up our list. Other inspirations include paintings by Shag and architecture by Frank Gehry.

Prints, patterns, and colors from different eras play a huge role in our designs. Clean geometric as well as fluid organic shapes, e.g. silhouettes of heads, are featured in our designs. We believe that the juxtaposition of diverse elements in surprising ways is essential to the evolution of design. We create surface interest and create a cornucopia of flavors.. We also like to have prints that are interesting from afar, and surprising when scrutinized closely.

Our biggest inspirations in current fashion are the prints and clever trims used by designers like Miu Miu and Marc Jacobs as well as the prints on bags by Angela Adams and Transversion Airlines. Companies such as Stussy and Penguin are more favorites.

One last note: in our line, we want images to speak for themselves, so we try to limit the words. Occasionally we have a word-oriented design, but we strive to create images that are strong on their own. We try to avoid generic sayings and words, and use letters as visual elements as well as meaning. We do name each of our lines, and many designs feature on the back or sleeve as well as the front, to create 360-degree interest.