All Le Papa’s products are created with stories, which quickly come alive on Jun Kim’s sketchbook. Le papa’s creative director Jun Kim still sees himself as a "story teller" or a "toy maker" rather than a director of the company.
Our signature play mat 'Le Bonheur Car village' was designed based on a familiar neighbourhood he and his son used to love. But he also made sure to communicate with his team as well as other moms and dads in the design process, so the product has many aspects of fun and excitement for other parents and their kids to play and interact with.
The play mat’s 3-dimensional details in each building and its surroundings will be recognized more and more as kids get older and develop greater sense of spatial awareness. And this will help parents and kids to communicate and play in more complex situations.
Director Jun Kim’s son is always the first one to try and test all Le Papa’s products. And the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree :-), his reactions and comments have always been so creative and insightful that they often play important rolls in our production process.
My little boy has always been the first tester of everything I have designed. This rug is no exception. It took quite a while till we produced a sample that we were happy with, so I was a little anxious to find out whether my son would still be as engaging as he always had been previously. It just started as me watching him rolling his toy cars around at first but somehow, I found all of us (me, my wife and the little one) playing and laughing together on this rug. My wife and I had been so busy that I could not remember the last time we all sat down and spent time together without any distraction. Watching my family having fun genuinely made me happy. And I stopped worrying about all those things I had brought home with me for months, things that were keeping me from playing and laughing with the two most important people in my life. Then it hit me. I said to my wife, “The name of this rug should reflect how we feel right now. It should not sound like just another toy that parents buy, put in their kid's room and forget about”. That is how 'Le Bonheur' was born. I hope it could bring happiness and laughter to you and your kids, just like the way it did to my family. – Jun Kim –
*Le Bonheur = Happiness in French