Open&Bloot!

This project is a collaboration with illustrator Femme ter Haar.

Sexuality is a topic that can be difficult to talk about between kids and their parents, and it often doesn’t happen until puberty kicks in. At this stage, it can be awkward and uncomfortable for teenagers. Because of that, we think it’s better to start talking about it at a young age. We wanted to make a fun tool to make it easier for parents and young children to do so.

We made a birthday calendar with a theme for every month. The themes include things like ‘how babies are made’, but also privacy, consent, diversity and gender. Diversity is key in the calendar. The body shapes and skin colours aren’t realistic, and no sexual preference is seen as ‘different’. Everyone is unique and we like to celebrate that!

For this project we talked to a lot of different people: transgenders, non-heterosexuals, people with non-heterosexual parents, non binary people, black people, parents, kids, and GGD Utrecht. We wanted this calendar to be appealing for everyone, and not leave anyone out.

You can put the calendar up in the bathroom, so you and your child can look at it every day, and start a conversation about the themes whenever you feel like it.