The designers of the best selling pushchair in the UK, iCandy have introduced a brand new version of their Strawberry pushchair from July 2017. This fabulous new addition to the fruity iCandy family sees their design team taking on board the views of parents and the new Strawberry pushchair has several upgrades from its previous model.
Quick Summary: Feasting your eyes on the luxurious boxes of the new iCandy Strawberry is enough to get any expectant parent excited. With everything you could need arriving in just two boxes, we couldn't wait to open them up and feast our eyes on the treats that were inside.
Whats good?
- Easier to fold
- Can fold with seat attached parent and world facing
- Excellent value with seat and carrycot included
- Great quality hard wearing fabrics
- Very stylish
Whats not so good?
- Seat size may not accommodate taller toddlers
- Seat doesn't sit fully upright
iCandy are possibly the most popular pushchair brand in the UK and are the celebrity pushchair of choice. In a recent Google trends survey, we found that iCandy prams were the most searched pushchairs for spring 2017. There are no surprises here though as iCandy have a reputation for achieving pushchair perfection in their superior design features and finish. The Strawberry was originally designed to be the affordable set of iCandy wheels, however it is now just as stylish and ‘en vogue’ as the rest of the sought after iCandy fleet.
There are 6 new colours available in the Strawberry range with a choice of either Chrome or Black chassis. These are: Slate, Carbon, Royal, Orchid, Amber and Natural Green.
Chassis
Feasting your eyes on the luxurious boxes of the new iCandy Strawberry is enough to get any expectant parent excited. With everything you could need arriving in just two boxes, we couldn’t wait to open them up and feast our eyes on the treats that were inside.
We’ve heard so much about the improvements made to the brand new Strawberry pushchair from iCandy, so we couldn’t wait to pop it all together and take a look for ourselves.
It was easy enough to assemble the pushchair following iCandy’s instructions which were clear and concise as ever. The assembly was basically achieved in three steps: popping the flavour pack onto the seat unit or carrycot, clicking the wheels onto the chassis and then finally popping the carrycot or seat unit onto the chassis (dependent on which one you intend to use).
The chassis itself is certainly sleek. The gorgeous curves of the Strawberry pushchair are accentuated perfectly by the chrome chassis we have in front of us for review, but we have also had a sneak peak at the black chassis which is just beautiful to look at! There is something exceedingly stylish about the elegant curves of the new Strawberry pushchair, whilst at the same time the chassis somehow oozes a sense of ‘I can handle anything!’
The handlebar is one of the first things we noticed about the new chassis design – it is now adorned in a gorgeous leatherette cover adding to the overall stylish presence of the pushchair as a whole. It’s lovely and soft to hold in the palm of your hand whilst at the same time is hardy enough to withstand the daily trials of life with a baby or toddler in tow. The handle adjusts telescopically in height to three different positions from 95cm at its lowest setting to 106cm at its highest setting – very handy if parents of different heights will be pushing their little one.
The wheels on the new iCandy Strawberry are certainly built to last. The broad rear wheels are the elegant driving force that push the smaller front swivel wheels over urban grounds smoothly. The wheels pop on and off in a jiffy, so if they get slightly mucky on a park walk or whilst strolling through muddy puddles, then just pop them off for a wash. It’s also handy to have the option to remove the broad rear wheels if you have to pack the Strawberry into a small car boot.
All four wheels have suspension which makes for a lovely ride for your little one. We definitely found this an advantage when shopping up and down streets of cobbles and paving stones.
The brake pedal has the expected iCandy flair to it. It’s situated centrally between the back wheels of the pushchair and the lovely size means you aren’t fumbling around searching for the pedal when you want to stop and start in a hurry.
The shopping basket on the Strawberry is one of the pushchairs great selling points. It is pretty large and is also spring loaded, so you can clip it down and use as a parcel tray for larger items or alternatively have the sides spring up to contain all of your smaller bits and bobs. With the seat on, there’s brilliant access to the basket from all angles, but with the carrycot in place you will need to remember to access the basket from the front of the pushchair as the bottom of the carrycot pretty much touches the top of the basket.
As iCandy’s affordable all-rounder, it is great to see that car seat adapters are included in the box rather than shelling out more pennies to get you travel system ready. The Strawberry 2 is compatible with the following car seats: Maxi-Cosi Cabrio Fix, Maxi-Cosi Pebble, Maxi-Cosi Pebble Plus, BeSafe iZiGo, Kiddy Evo Lunafix, Kiddy Evolution Pro 2, Cybex Aton Q, Cybex Cloud Q, Joie iGemm, Nuna Pipa, Recaro Privia, Evoluna i-Size, and finally the BeSafe iZiGo Modular.
Seat and Carrycot
The Strawberry comes with both the carrycot and seat unit fabrics in the box, so if you are using the pushchair from birth you will need to attach the carrycot fabrics to the seat frame, as well as the flavour pack’ hood. Then, when you no longer need the carrycot, you pop it off and use the seat unit fabrics and colour pack on the same frame.
To remove the carrycot from the chassis just use your thumbs to pull the little levers either side of the carrycot all the way towards the front of the pushchair and then the fixed position bumper bar acts as a carry handle to lift the carrycot off the frame and transport it from place to place.
The carrycot is advised to be used for the six months of your baby’s life and is a snug and cosy place for a little one to rest and play until they are ready to use the seat unit. The carrycot has lovely soft sides and covers which are removable in the inevitable occasion of an accident. It is also suitable for permanent overnight sleeping which will come in handy for the odd night away or short holiday.
The same hood from the flavour pack is used on both the carrycot and the seat unit so when you are ready to move to the seat unit, just un-pop the carrycot from the seat frame and pop on the seat fabrics. It really is that simple! This also applies to the fixed position bumper bar. It is a carry handle for the carrycot and a bumper bar for the seat unit. Having been upgraded from the previous model of the Strawberry, it is now covered in the same gorgeous leatherette material as the handlebar.
The Strawberry seat unit pops onto the frame without any effort, just as the carrycot did. It is also removed from the frame in the same way as the carrycot. The seat can face both parent or the world which is handy for both younger babies and toddlers. The seat itself is 49cm high and we found that our 2 years 3 months tester was a little too tall for the seat as his head brushed the hood, this is worth bearing in mind for taller or older children.
Perhaps the crowning glory of the new Strawberry has to be the fabulous new colourways that are available. We tested out the Amber colourway which is a gorgeous deep mustard yellow. The depth and quality of the new fabrics on the hood are typically iCandy and are a very similar texture to the hoods of the other iCandy pushchairs. The liner is slightly softer and almost silky making the seat comfortable for its little passenger. Everything is washable too, which will no doubt come as a relief to parents who know how messy the little cherubs can be at times!
There has also been an upgrade to the harness of the new Strawberry. Not only does the brand new disc shaped harness look amazing, it is also very easy to buckle up and far less of a fiddle than the previous model.
For a comfy position, the seat has three recline positions upright, resting and horizontal and these reclines can be used no matter which way the seat is facing. Although not a one handed motion, the recline system is smooth so there is no chance of waking a sleeping baby and it is operated by pushing the easy to locate levers with your thumb and rotating the seat to position 1, 2 or 3 as labelled on the chassis. The seat doesn’t sit bolt upright, which tended to mean our little testers pulled themselves up from the seat using the bumper bar.
Drivability
As an all-rounder, you’d expect the Strawberry to be able to handle most situations – and that it can! The all wheel suspension makes handling gravel and pavements a breeze and baby didn’t even notice when we popped up and down curbs.
Steering around corners was a doddle and could even be done one handed. We locked the front wheels off when we wanted to tackle going over grass at the park, but there was never a struggle.
The new Strawberry was also extremely light to push, even when laden with a 2.5 year old toddler!
Fold
The Strawberry has always been renowned for its pretty nifty fold and with this latest edition the fold just got EVEN better!
The clever engineering from iCandy means that the new Strawberry can still be folded with the seat in place, either parent or world facing. This is a super feature if you are catching public transport and using your car a lot and need a one piece fold. But, it is the way the fold is operated that has changed! The fold used to be operated with a tiny button on the centre of the handlebar, but now the main fold release has been moved to the left hand side of the pushchair frame – which feels all the more natural when operating the fold system.
The unique Step and Fold system still stands and you simply place your foot on the elegant curves at the base of the chassis and with one sharp and swift movement downward with the handlebar and with the lever to the left of the frame pulled into position, the pushchair will fold forwards into a smart package.
The chassis doesn’t have an automatic lock but it can be held together with a manual plastic hook clip which is then easily released with your thumb when you need to pop the pushchair up again. This a clever pushchair too, as when you pop the chassis back up, it remembers exactly what position your seat unit was in so you don’t need to fiddle getting it back to the right angle again.
Conclusion
iCandy have really listened to feedback from us parents to improve the design and usability of their all-round Strawberry pushchair.
We love the changes that the leatherette handlebar and bumper bar covers, new harness buckle, and new improved fold bring to the new Strawberry pushchair. They are all features which mean it gives an image just as stylish as iCandy’s other iconic pushchairs whilst being able to handle most terrains.
The fact that you get everything you could need from birth in the box makes for super affordability with a premium brand label.
We would have liked to have seen the seat of the Strawberry gain a little height to accommodate taller toddlers and the fact that the bucket seat doesn’t sit fully upright might frustrate a few nosy little passengers!
