About - Meet the Team

Meet The Founders

Yana's story...

I started my first clothing brand back in 2003 when I was a university student, and it has been my full-time job ever since! Things I love most in life are friends, cats, gardening, sewing, bike rides, good food, and finding vintage treasures.

After making womens' clothes for 8 years, I decided to try out baby clothes! Now I create a selection of womens' and baby/toddler clothing. Much of my clothing features digitally printed illustrations either by myself or my illustrator friends. The fabric is printed in the USA for the woven fabrics or in Canada for the cotton/spandex. I try to use eco-friendly or at least natural/biodegradable fabrics for the rest of the fabric as often as possible. I've also been working closely with Delyla Fabrics for my sweatshirt fabrics. They're one of the few Montreal fabric mills left in existence! They make awesome organic cotton fleece right in my hometown.

After years of trying to sew everything myself and turning down wholesale orders, I decided to start looking for some outside help! It's very important to me to keep it local and to get to know the people I am working with. Last year I started working with Services de Coupe 3P, a professional cutting service, and also a small family run sewing contractor here in Montreal to keep up with the demand of my wholesale orders. I'm still a very active participant in the process. I make the original design and my own patterns. I coordinate with the cutter and sewer and lug things back and forth on the metro. I inspect each garment carefully. I take care of all of my emails with customers. I pack all of my orders and print postage myself. I'm very proud to support my local economy as I strongly believe we small designers can make a difference in bringing back local manufacturing to North America.

In 2015 I met Anna and we decided to create Petit Nomad - a clothing and accessories brand for families always on-the-go.

Anna's story...

I was born in the Soviet Union in the late 80s. After finishing university, I traveled and worked as a journalist in Moscow, Barcelona, and Prague, where I met my husband. In 2008, we moved to Mexico where I worked as a translator in the remote parts of the country. I was fascinated by the indigenous culture, the pre-Hispanic and colonial architecture, the traditional dresses, and the music.

We traveled Latin America, briefly working in Caracas, Venezuela, where we met some wonderful people. In 2010, we moved to Canada so I could complete my master’s degree in communications. We settled in Montreal and were charmed by its cultural diversity and openness.

After traveling through so much of the world, I was enchanted by all the differences in people, cultures, and ethnic backgrounds. I wanted to keep travelling, but by then, my husband and I had a son. As much as we loved our new life at home with the baby, I had often wondered if there was a way to travel easily and comfortably as a young family.

Many great ideas have been born out of filling unmet needs, and I began searching for practical ideas to make travelling with children easier. I was excited and encouraged when I met a group of families with children who were united by their love of travel and adventure. Having kids never stopped them from dreaming big and living boldly. I got lots of ideas from watching how they navigated family vacations and outings.

I met Yana at a local artistic fair in Montreal in 2014 and immediately fell in love with her clothing designs. We talked about our passion for travel, art, family, kids, pets and friendships. We had a shared goal to create clothes and accessories for children that would allow families have adventures without having to worry and fuss about what to bring. That led us to create Petit Nomad: an inspiration, a dream, and a tribute to our immense love for different cultures, amazing people, adventures, and travel.