When I was pregnant with my first child eight years ago, the world of children’s furniture was downright depressing. It didn’t matter if your apartment was minimalist, contemporary, or shabby chic – your children’s rooms were going to be straight out of a fairy tale.

Back then, the cribs had traditional spindles along the sides, changing tables had conservative silhouettes, and rockers were covered in green chintz and pink plaid. Children’s bedding was frilly. Their desks and chairs were dainty. Their carpets were cute.

If you think Dr. Ferber’s revision on sleep training is revolutionary, try walking into the new children’s store on Lexington Avenue, Giggle. The age of innovative children’s design has arrived. Giggle features an “edited collection of only the best baby products … putting the ‘giggle’ back into parenthood.”

This uber-urban boutique rates each product according to 10 criteria that include the usual measures such as safety, but it also evaluates products on their innovation, design, and social consciousness.

Inside the modish store, which has two other outposts (on Wooster Street in SoHo and at the Marina in San Francisco), you can find a dazzling array of modern goodies for your children and their rooms. There is Dwell Baby bedding and the Netto Collection of nursery furniture, famously purchased for Gwyneth Paltrow’s daughter, Apple. There are several spare European lines of furniture, such as Duc Duc, Stokke, and Oeuf. And of course, there’s that Bugaboo stroller in a Day-Glo rainbow of colors.

Giggle is not the only company determined to introduce clean lines and fashion-forward thinking to our offspring before they can crawl.

Design Within Reach, the company that brought the designs of Ray and Charles Eames, Mies van der Rohe, and Philippe Starck into the vernacular, just launched DWRjax, a collection of furniture, toys, and knick-knacks for children.

“At DWR, we believe that kids are born modernists because they know instinctively that form and function go together like the fingers of their hands,” the mission statement begins. Who knew?

Many companies once aimed solely at adults now target children. Pottery Barn has Pottery Barn Kids and Teens, the Company Store has Company Kids, and Pier 1 has Pier 1 Kids.

And of course there are several new online sites such as moderntots.com dedicated to spreading good taste to our children. “Why shouldn’t their furniture look as good as the rest of the house?” ask founders Sarah Rubenstein and Bruce Marsh in their statement to customers.

I’ll tell you why. Children are not miniature adults. Their rooms, in fact, do not need to look as good as the rest of the house. Unlike the rest of the house, in five years their rooms will not only look inappropriate, they also will most likely look worn out.

The furniture in a newborn’s room is not likely to be the same in a 5-year-old’s room, which is not likely to be the same in the 10-year-old’s room, which is not likely to remain in a 15-year-old’s room.

“These companies have realized how much money parents are willing to pay to have their kid’s rooms look a certain way, “a mother of two said. “Especially in New York, where people cannot stop talking about their renovations. I guess it’s a logical extension that if people are competitive about their children, they’re going to be competitive about the stylistic qualities of their children’s clothes and toys and bedrooms.”

Needless to say, a stroll through Giggle didn’t put the giggle back into my parenting. It left me with a gnawing feeling that despite my certainty otherwise, my children’s rooms were inadequate, out-of-date, even unfashionable.

“I admit that I spent a fortune decorating my kids’ rooms. They look so funky and offbeat and mod. I love them but my kids couldn’t care less. My son doesn’t even notice, and all my daughter wants are those stupid princess sheets at Target,” a mother of two said.

“It creates a pressure that simply didn’t exist in previous generations,” a mother of four said. “No one used to hire decorators to help them design their children’s rooms. But today I know so many people who do exactly that.”

The celebrity baby boom is partly to blame for all these hip children’s designs. When Madonna needed maternity clothes, designers realized that those nine months, once viewed as a fashion wasteland, were actually an opportunity.

Similarly, heaven forbid the offspring of Liv Tyler, Angelina Jolie, and Kates Hudson and Winslet rest their young bottoms on traditional furniture. These starlets are so unconventional it goes without saying that their children’s rooms should be equally fabulous. Maybe their children are even born modernists who instinctively know that form and function go together like the fingers of their hands.

I doubt it.

sarasberman@aol.com