What I was met with upon entering the Fair was both overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time.  Overwhelming in the sense that most fairs are; the huge amount of stuff on display before you and only a short amount of time to take it all in and make sense of it.  Underwhelming in the realization that a lot of it, no – most of it, was crap.  As soon as I started to walk down the rows I felt a strange sense of familiarity.  Why?  I had never been here before…  Then I realized that it was because I had seen a lot of the stuff on display before.  Maybe not the actual stuff but toys very much like them.  So much of what was showing across the entire Fair were toys that had been licensed to carry familiar characters from the Star Wars, Hello Kitty, Disney and Pokemon brands.  Just like they have been for years.  There was some very cute stuff, but overall it didn’t seem as though there was much innovation.  Maybe I could have found it had I spent more time there and dug deeper into some of the companies.  I am not sure.

There were, though, a couple companies that caught my eye.  One of them is a company called ‘Makedo’.  A young company from Australia that developed reusable plastic connectors and hinges that kids can use to fasten boxes and packaging together to make things.  I told the reps that as a kid I used tape and glue to make things out of old boxes.  What makes this better?  Well, they told me, tape is environmentally unfriendly, the Makedo connectors are not.  Hmmm… how much better is Makedo than some tape and Elmer’s glue?  And aren’t we already being totally environmentally unfriendly by buying so much stuff that comes in boxes and plastic packaging?  Hasn’t the damage mostly been done?  Not sure I was convinced.  But I know that some kids just are not self-motivated to be creative in this way.  So if Makedo connectors are the catalyst they need to get started exercising that compositional part of their brain then great.  Job well done.

I couldn’t help though, when looking at Makedo’s products, being reminded of an artist whose work I enjoy.  A few years ago the artist, Hirsch Perlman, had just moved and ended up with a room full of boxes and packing material.  He decided to make a pinhole camera from one of the boxes and then photographed the room as he transformed and retransformed the boxes into humanoid creatures that grew, morphed, intertwined and disintegrated.  Hauntingly beautiful photographs I think.  I then wondered if Perlman would have found the Makedo connectors more liberating or restricting had he used them instead of tape?  Of course no way to know, but something to ponder.  Regardless, I think the Makedo system is an interesting beginning to a company that is trying to (yes, I am going to say it) think outside of the box. So cheesy, I know.  I hope they succeed.  In the meantime, I think it might help if they add a few more splashes of color to their building material photographs.  Maybe the kits could come with a couple jars of environmentally friendly paint that the kids could use to paint some of their found boxes with?  Just a thought.

Another company that caught my eye was BIC Plastics from Hong Kong.  I will be the first to admit that I am a sucker the whole vinyl figure genre.  I can’t walk by a Kidrobot store. I am compelled to go in and look at everything.  BIC Plastics was no different.  But the most interesting thing that I noticed was that they were featuring a new line of toys by artist Tristan Eaton.  The extensive collection is called ‘dinki’, and is not yet released but it’s essentially a renaming and extension of Eaton’s ‘Runts’ line.  There will be lots of ‘dinki’ figures in lots of different products and all pretty dern cute.

Way back in the corner of the ‘garden’ floor of the Toy Fair were friends from AREAWARE.  Veterans of fairs such as ICFF and the Gift Fair, the AREAWARE crew were at the Toy Fair to show their line of wooden toys, especially the new Cubebot by designer David Weeks.  Fun stuff.  Definitely more warm, tactile and visually inviting than most of the other stuff in the Fair.  I just hope kids today know what wood is….

The one other notable thing that I will mention is that the amazing Ugly Doll brand continues to grow.  They have added eight new characters to their line for 2010.  Even through this ugly economy Ugly Doll has kept on growing and expanding their collection and product categories.  They are quite the success story and, dangit, an inspiration to all of us entrepreneurs out there.

Even though the Toy Fair is of ‘giant-robot’ proportions, and the amount of flotsam and jetsam to be waded through is deep, there were still a few gems that could be found.  I hope that the economy recovering its footing will be what the industry needs to spur some more innovation and creativity in its toy designers.

Unfortunately I was at the Gift Fair for only a short time.  And I was carrying a baby.  Why?  Well I seem to be doing that a lot lately.  And evidently, as I found out when I arrived, the Gift Fair does not allow strollers.  Gift Fair… what the heck?  Thank goodness Jamie was there to help.  So… I sucked it up, stashed the stroller and carried the mini boss. 

The first booth I stopped by was neo-utility, run by Kip Kotzen.  Kip looked up, said ‘hi’ and the kid immediately started crying.  Uh-oh… was this all a bad idea?  I had no idea what I was doing.  Was I in over my head in terms of my skill as a care-taker?  I quickly walked him to the wall to show him neo-utility’s new ‘ShapeMaker’ blocks by Miller Goodman.  That seemed to capture his attention.  Very cute and done in nice bright colors.  Somewhere around this moment the drool started flowing.  Triggered by the block animals?  Not wanting to bother Kip any longer, or risk another crying jag, I kept moving.

A quick stop and ‘hello’ at Suck UK was next.  A fun group that immediately took to the kid’s ‘Life Is Good’ socks.  Suck UK is one company that has seemed to weather the global financial freeze without too much trouble.  Their collection of cheeky and clever products continues to expand with every show. 

Another fave in the ‘UK’ category are our friends at W2 Products.  Victoria Whitbread and Jackie Wilkinson.  Lovely people.  W2 is the comapny behind the ridiculously successful ‘Panotone’ line of mugs, bags, etc.  They have been expanding their collection into Eames design stationary as well as a growing collection of baby products.  The drooliong accelerated when they gave my sidekick a teething ring to chew on.  Great to see them and catch up a little.

The AREAWARE booth has grown into an anchor of the ‘Accent on Design’ section of the show.  Always a good place to stop.  The ‘Transport’ section of their product line has developed into a collection of really cool bikes.  The ‘STRiDA’bike that AREAWARE is representing continues to get great exposure.  We had a nice chat with Noel Wiggins, AREAWARE’s president, who took to the little guy right away.  Unfortunately this was the moment in our Gift Show adventure that he decides to start barfing.  The kid, not Noel.  I found myself wiping Noel’s jacket with a wet-wipe and apologizing profusely.  Thankfully Noel was very good natured about it all.  Evidently he has experience with this parenting thing.

Not wanting to wear out my welcome any more than I already had, we said goodbye and moved on.  The rest of the ‘Accent on Design’ section of the Gift Show went rather quickly.  I did not get the sense that there was much new to be seen.  The Artecnica booth looked great as usual.  Mint is always nice.  But not much was jumping out at me as new and exciting.

But what was strange to me was that everyone that I had talked to said that they were having a good show.  A good amount of traffic and orders.  So what was at play here?  Maybe it was that 2009 had been so bleak that people were happy to just get back to something that felt more comfortable.  And the absence of much new product might just be that companies have been trying to sustain themselves in a holding pattern over the world’s economic turmoil.  2009 claimed the lives of many small design companies.  This Spring Gift Fair might just have been those that survived breathing a little sigh of relief.  Hopefully this is a sign of a wave of new products and design directions for the next Gift Fair in August.  I look forward to it.