Portrait: Claudia Fischer-Appelt
CLAUDIA FISCHER-APPELT IS ...
Claudia Fischer-Appelt
... our woman of the week, because the designer with her initiative mamamoto gives a face to today's lifestyle of families - far away from little bears and other stereotypes. Hamburg-based Claudia Fischer-Appelt (40) founded the family initiative mamamoto in March 2005. As the mother of two children, she felt surrounded by ugly little bear changing pads and Alete advertisements. With creative actions, aesthetic products and a manifesto she fights for a modern, authentic family image. Goal: to make you feel like family. Now her first book is published: "Family Business - The book for parents who do not want to be perfect".
How did Claudia Fischer-Appelt come up with her initiative? There are mutliple reasons for this. She is ...
... style conscious: Sometimes it's productive when a mother gets angry. "When I got Anton, I went to a baby market for the first time in my life, and suddenly I found myself in a parallel world with brightly colored plastic and knobby bunnies! I stood there and thought, where did I land here ?!" says Claudia Fischer -Appelt. "Everywhere the same unimaginative baby products!" But she got really angry with the second child. "Nothing has changed, but even parents deserve good design!"
... aggressive: The mentally-minded mothers on the playground also put the Hamburgerin to. Like, you are not in any pekip group? Like, you were not kidding? "This whole good mother theme has made me excited and angry, but also the public debate, which reminds me in their ideological stubbornness of war," said Claudia Fischer-Appelt. All this has nothing to do with the lifestyle of today's families. And that's exactly what the mother of two wants to portray in her first mamamoto book. Without raised finger, but with a lot of humor.
... creative: Claudia Fischer-Appelt logically demands in the mamamoto founding manifesto of 2005. She distributed alternative greeting cards for Mother's Day in Hamburg and initiated a t-shirt exchange day (ugly printed versus pretty in mamamoto design) The year 2000 saw the addition of self-designed products such as baby bottles and buttons.The website www.mamamoto.de offers a variety of other lesson plans and coloring pages for the little ones.For their book, families from the circle of friends and acquaintances took part the designer a "protector monster" series.
... idiosyncratic: Claudia Fischer-Appelt realizes all mamomoto actions within her design agency. It was important to her that not only fathers and mothers are in the team. "So that the view stays outside." She quickly realized how persistently stuck the child schema in the mind. "The graphics are made by a young illustrator who has no children, his first designs were pastel-colored, round and bumpy! I wanted to make it tougher, his objection was, 'It's for kids!'" "Yes, but for me too" his boss replied. It took half a year for her to be satisfied.
... humorous: Playful instead of cheesy, authentic instead of contrived, turquoise instead of baby blue - childlike forms are also found in the mamamoto world, only ironically broken. For example, the (bear-free) online shop offers thick spiders and good-humored bats as tattoos. The Barbie color pink in turn plays a key role in Fischer-Appelt's book in the gloss "A man sees pink". The mother does not even take her own mission: "I really do not want to banish the bears, in the first place I want to show alternatives."
... provocative: A monkey holds a coconut in his hand. How should he crack the nut? With a bomb? Or rather with a machete? Claudia Fischer-Appelt came up with the idea for the mamamoto wallpaper when she herself was looking for children's wallpaper and found nothing that she liked. The first reactions in the company's intranet were fierce. "As soon as this wallpaper was out, people got excited, the motive was glorifying violence." Claudia Fischer-Appelt puts up with the fact that she is infected: "I think that a product for children may be cheeky and funny, even if it violates political correctness."
... modest: Mamamoto has received four design awards so far. Now the knighthood: For the prestigious Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany in 2008, the family initiative was nominated twice. No reason for Claudia Fischer-Appelt to stand out: "Of course we are happy about any price and especially a nomination for the Design Award of the Federal Republic is an award, because you can not apply, but will be picked out. Do not overstate history. "
... not alone: In 2006, Claudia Fischer-Appelt commissioned an opinion research study on the public family image. The result: Almost half of all childless respondents considered the current family picture to be unaesthetic and dissuasive. Claudia Fischer-Appelt: "I had the impression that I needed to prove that alternatives were needed, and if I find the prevailing family image unattractive, it rather deters me to start my own family." That was the proof I wanted to show and that's what the study confirmed. "
... anarchic: Once a month in the house Fischer-Appelt "pig day", where parents and children let out the pig together. What that looks like, you can look at in the chapter "Today is Swine Day" in the mamamoto book. The only rule: Everyone is allowed to behave at the table as he wishes. Absolutely recommended for imitation, finds Claudia Fischer-Appelt. "This constant 'do not do this' and 'do not do it' is unbelievably exhausting, so I invented an exceptional day to chant about." Her sons Anton (8) and Fritz (4) think it's great.
Recommended reading: Claudia Fischer-Appelt: Family Business - The book for parents who do not want to be perfect, Edition Braus, 128 pages, 19,90 Euro
