I was really excited about this product but it is a total disappointment. I read all the other negative reviews but didn't want to believe them b/c it's just so cute! Well it came today and after about 10 minutes of having it out I knew it had to go back.
*The smell is VERY strong, smells like paint fumes. Granted, I only had it out for a few minutes, maybe after a few days of airing it out it would go away, but I didn't want this smell around my son for any amount of time at all. I've heard this complaint with other foam mats, though, so maybe this is not avoidable. It is a STRONG smell, though.
*In the photos this mat looks so much cuter than all the other available foam mats for kids. But in person the colors just aren't as cute - for the blue/gold at least. Hard to describe, but the colors are a little less bold, not as rich. (Still much better looking compared to the ABC mats, though.)
*The texture - In the photos, this mat looks smooth and soft, sort of shiny, whereas the product photos of other foam mats make them look textured and sort of rough, not smooth at all. And they call themselves textured. This product calls itself smooth but when you get it it's just as textured (or seem to be just as textured) as all the other mats on the market, and doesn't have a "smooth" quality about it the way I expected. It does not have a "shiny" side.
*I thought this mat would be thicker and/or softer than other mats, but it is not. It is about 1/2" thick, which isn't necessarily bad, but to me it's not thick enough or soft enough for my almost 6-month-old to play on without any additional blankets or etc. It is very thin and very firm.
*Too many pieces - This is the complaint most people who had negative reviews wrote about it, and I figured we'd just deal with that, and maybe our son would have fun with it. This isn't a major reason we're going to return it but I did notice right away how easily they come apart. When you take a square out of the package, the circle immediately falls out, just to give you an idea of how not-that-snug they are. But on the floor it does seem to stay in place, but I can't comment too much on that since again, we didn't really use it.
Overall the quality is just not enough. Or, really, the quality paired with the physical appearance of it, is just not enough. I thought the cute blue/gold (brown) modern colors made it worth it for us to spend like double the price on this mat vs. some other ones, but the colors aren't as cute in person (maybe the other color sets are), it's too thin and firm for us, and the fumes were too strong.
Now, if you really like the colors (hopefully you can find them in person at a store to check it out first), then this might be worth it. Just be prepared to air it out, and know that it will be as much of a toy as it is a mat when your child is old enough to get the pieces out, and while your baby is very young be prepared to use some additional padding for his/her comfort. The padding might be fine for an older toddler. Also, though I don't know for sure, I can't imagine it being that much harder to keep clean than any other mat - it looks like all the other ones, similar texture - why would it attract more dust (like others have talked about)?
***Edit: I've had this product for several months now after deciding not to return it after all. We use just the blue/brown pieces and it looks great and we've had no issues. Yes our son likes to take the pieces apart but not that often and it's fun for him when he does. It does not attract dust or dirt and is easy to clean. I take back a lot of what I wrote here b/c I was being too picky. I was expecting the padding to be so thick but I was expecting an unreasonable amount of padding. It is pretty nice cushioning underfoot and when baby falls back or etc. Skip Hop 20 Piece 70"x56" PlaySpot Floor Mat, Blue/Gold
Nice colors, but this mat gets DIRTY and scratched very easily. Not very good quality, either...the pieces don't always fit nice and snug so leaves spaces between them, which collect lots of dust, baby snack crumbs and etc...(Can't believe it was designed for babies/kids!) Very very disappointed...I want to send it back to the product design dept. at Skip Hop. DON'T BUY!!
I am very happy with my play spot. I bought it for the following reasons: 1. I wanted to set aside a safe, clean area for my baby to play and explore where there would be no foot traffic 2. I wanted to protect my baby from hitting the floor and 3. I wanted something that would look nice in our loft apartment (most of the baby stuff out there is garish, ugly and in awful colors). Unlike other reviewers, I don't have any issues keeping it clean. Yes, it gets dusty, but no more than the rest of our wood floors (and we live near Ground Zero where there is a ton of construction/dust all over the place) and in fact, it is cleaner than the rest of the floors because we don't walk over it. In terms of the gaps, I don't have any issues because I'm not trying to protect the floor from the baby; rather, I'm trying to protect the baby from the floor. For this purpose, it works extremely well, especially during the transition period when the baby is still perfecting the art of sitting up. The design and colors are great; they don't cheapen the look of our loft unlike most of the baby things out there.
Since this product meets all of my needs, I give it 5 stars.
The mat we received had foam pieces of varying thickness and density with numerous other defects including holes, pits, fingerprints (moulded into the foam) and so on. The foam pieces do not all fit together well. Pet hair and dirt stick to it almost as if it were a lint roller. The tiles are not textured the same on both sides, so you can't flip one over if it gets damaged--the product sheet says to install them shiny side up.'
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