Billes & Co
The hypnotic power of marbles
The magic of marbles
You know the marbles, these little glass marbles with which all the children have played, us, you, your mom, your grandpa, and even your ancestors. Even for an adult, marbles are magic. We like to contemplate them in the light, to touch them, to roll them. So Billes & Co wanted to know where they came from, how we played them...
And they wondered how this game had crossed the ages, the countries, to reach your pockets. Especially today, that in many countries, the beautiful marbles are sold in bulk in plastic nets or large jars. And no one ever sees how beautiful they really are.
Explorers
Like researchers, they went to see what people do with marbles in other places, and at other times. They met amateurs, players, manufacturers, and documented it...
A real adventure! And they discovered incredible things! In the past, in the United States, the marbles were offered to children in beautiful boxes, organised in rows, sorted by type of marble. It was like “treasures of precious stones”. This immediately caught their attention and they wanted to have these boxes right here, right now!
So they thought of creating boxes to store the most beautiful marbles and organise them into “universes”. Why? Because they are in fact like small pieces of the world, “molecules”. They make us dream and think of 1000 and 1 things: Animals, landscapes, stories...
The Atelier of treasures
So, the Atelier Billes & Co was opened. The only marble universe factory for light years around!
To make up their boxes, they find marbles all over the world , in Mexico, Holland, Germany… and they bring them all to France.
At the Atelier, the marbles are arrange by colour, by texture, according to the worlds they inspire us. Then, beautiful illustrations are created to decorate the boxes. And those “mini-worlds” are built in boxes made by natural products: cardboard, paper. No plastic! Paper with the most beautiful colours is used to fold and store the marbles.
All marbles are arranged by hand, are checked for defects and size. Then the label is placed and the box closes.
To the toy stores
And soon, the box leaves the Atelier, heading for the beautiful shops like Inspiration Tales!
Marble boxes are packaged safely in cartons and sent to beautiful toy shops around the world. That's why afterwards, your mom, your grandpa or a friend can offer you a nice box of marbles.
And when you too have your Billes & Co box, you will not be wondering anymore why they did it: Because it's obvious that it's so much better to play with beautiful things!!
