OUR STORY
Our paper doll collection is a powerful celebration of women and girls, of artistic freedom, vivid color and individuality, all beautifully illustrated by our Founder and Creative Director Anja Kroencke. It celebrates diversity, creativity and the joy of self expression and encourages young children to create their own style and let their imagination play. Inspired by the cherished tradition of paper dolls the collection invites you to dress up and endlessly explore. Each time you add a new doll to your collection, you can mix and match from each wardrobe, creating infinite new looks. Mini metal brads are used to assemble the dolls and allow for playful movement. The paper dolls were born when Anja’s eldest daughter was home for weeks, recuperating from a concussion, with electronics of any kind forbidden. The two of them spent hours drawing and crafting and creating stories. And so, Of Unusual Kind was born. Each doll and every single piece of her wardrobe are hand illustrated, printed in the United States, and hand assembled in our studio in NYC.
ABOUT ANJA
Anja Kroencke was born in Vienna, Austria, where she studied Textile Design and Fashion Illustration. Her upbringing was strongly influenced by the city’s rich culture and her family’s multicultural roots. After graduation, she pursued a career in graphic design and at age 25 moved to New York City. There she quickly moved from design & art director to full time fashion illustrator. She first became well known in the late 90s for her unique manipulation of color, texture and space to create delicate and stylish silhouettes, truly on the forefront of what became a significant movement in illustration. Her commercial client list grew exponentially during this time from major advertising campaigns for Seagram’s and Johnson & Johnson to editorial stories in Vogue and Wallpaper Magazine. She was commissioned for a wide variety of projects beyond the page as well, from store windows for Printemps in Paris to to a line of mannequins for Ralph Pucci International to a limited edition of illustrated cosmetic bags for M.A.C.Cosmetics.