Kids' furniture plays off cartoon characters

HIGH POINT, N.C. — SpongeBob SquarePants, the undersea cartoon character, has surfaced with a line of furniture for the guppy set. Produced by Lea Furniture in association with Nickelodeon, the My Room furniture featuring the two-dimensional celebrities SpongeBob, Go Diego Go and Dora the Explorer was rolled out during the Fall International Home Furnishings Market and will be in retail stores by spring.

The furniture comes in three distinct groups designed for children in three age groups: Nick for 3-7 years old, TweenNick for 8-11 and TeenNick.

Funky shapes and fun features are the hallmarks of the collection, including a stow-away storage staircase in which each step is a drawer. Tents are part of the package with the Adventure Loft set. The Grow With Me play table and desk adjust in height from 20 to 30 inches. The furniture is made to grow with the child whatever age he enters the market.

The Nick line includes colorful seating such as the Flippin' Out chaise and the Chillin' Out love seat.

TweenNick fans can get a serpentine-shaped six-drawer chest and the Rollin' chair for gaming. All of it is interchangeable depending on taste.

Reversible drawer and bed panels flip from plain to graphics ensuring Nickelodeon's green slime oozes from the chest of drawers and glows in the dark. But the panels can be switched to plain once children outgrow the glow.

For teens, double beds are surrounded by two walls of cubbies and shelves — great for books and magazines, trophies and trinkets or a small-screen TV. The Suite bed is like a mini-apartment. A desk, bookshelves and a small-scale television stand on casters finish off the room. TeenNick also has a Studio Loft bed and something called The Flat. The Flat bed is set with a pair of wall-mounted nightstands with cantilevered drawers. It has a very sleek European look.

With this stuff populating their private space you won't have any trouble sending them to their room. So gone are the days when it was a punishment.

Prepare to build a dungeon.

Patricia Sheridan can be reached at psheridan@post-gazette.com.

Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.