As a child Nina used to play at being a danseuse étoile (main ballet dancer), an Austrian Empress, a mother or even a groceries seller, and was never tired of playing with her two sisters. She also loved exploring her grandmother’s cupboards at her home in Saint-Marcelin-de-Cray ̶ an old presbytery with cold water and a toilet in the garden ̶ digging out items such as old prams or embroidered sheets. Her grandmother and then her mother soon decided to teach her how to cook and sew. When she grew up she became first a photojournalist for outdoor sports, travel and decoration magazines, and then a school teacher (for seven years) with a penchant for new learning approaches. Today she is still on the lookout for new challenges and has decided to take her chances by creating the toy brand encore! In the encore! world, a wild bunch of organic cotton rabbits imagine a new way of living in a friendly neighbourhood. Here helping one another and respecting the environment are main priorities and nature is always just round the corner. By the way, the rabbits’ first names ̶ Henriette, Fernand and Augustine ̶ are actually the names of Nina’s great-grandparents … in real life.