Stories

In 1884 Robert Louis Stevenson fell in love with the magical realm of toy theatres –miniature stages on which one could enact the spectacles of the day–at Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop. “If you love art, folly, or the bright eyes of children,” he wrote, “speed to Pollock’s.” Miraculously, one can still speed to Pollock’s Toyshop in…

Curious Pip (Sarah Burford)  is a doll and miniature maker as well as illustrator based in Bristol. Ever since she was a child, her main inspirations come from old Hollywood movies, old cloth dolls, vintage mannequins and 1930s-40s comic strip characters. A collection of her dolls in flawless classic Hollywood glamour will be available to…

Talking Toys at Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop  14 – 24th September 2023 An exhibition of objects from Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop and responses from the ‘In-heritage Group’: Gabriele Brambilla, Jason Cleverly, Geoff Coupland, Peter Maloney, Colin Priest, Jar Sukthana, and Rachel Emily Taylor. The ‘In-heritage Group’ was established over the pandemic by University of the Arts London…

Longtime collaborator of Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop Geoff Coupland aka Mr Zeel talks to Chiara about zines. Geoff runs the seminal Comic Club at Camberwell Art College with Peony Gent & Joe Kessler Alongside zine and toy making Geoff teaches illustration and has participated in our current exhibition ‘Talking Toys’ where the In-Heritage Group of the…

Like any respectable Victorian toy shop, Benjamin Pollocks cannot help but be filled with all sorts of everyday treasures: from colourful paper scraps to fragments of Christmas decorations, doll faces to miniature tea sets, stringless vintage marionettes to broken second-hand toy theatres. All sorts of vintage as well as contemporary ephemera can be found here!…

“When she was good, She was very good indeed, But when she was bad she was horrid” (Poem by Longfellow) Hannah Dyson’s Nursery Rhyme Decorations exhibited at Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop in Spring 23 are exuberant and joyful interpretations, but here new team member Chiara talks to Hannah about the dark undertones of Victorian nursery rhymes…

Much of my ideas of what a perfect Christmas should be come from the book ‘An Edwardian Christmas’ by J.S.Goodall. Part of a series of 4 illustrated books on ‘The Edwardians’, the fashions of which were revisited in the 1970s when the books were published. J. S. Goodall was born an Edwardian in 1908 and…

This July I met with the artist and writer Charlotte Cory in Paris to discuss her new project for Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop ‘Acting Up’. Charlotte, on the way to meet me decided to explore the cemetery of Montmartre to find the tomb of French novelist and playwright Alexandre Dumas. Her interest piqued by a recent…

An exhibition of Handmade Dolls at Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop  1st April – 26th April 2022 (NOW EXTENDED UNTIL 24th May) Eileen Lam of Dolly Treasures Anthony Lewis Churchill Viola Ann Seddon This Easter Benjamin Pollock’s Toyshop is celebrating the joy of making a doll. In lockdown many of us re-discovered the fun of playing and…

As a boy John Macfarlane was shown how to make a miniature theatre from a matchbox by his father. He has gone on to combine his love for architecture, art and music in a long and distinguished career in theatre design. His painterly visions have brought vivid life to some of the world’s best known…

Memories of street games we played as children have left us with a lively nostalgia for certain toys. And memories of playtimes – often outside, often without an adult in sight – still feel to us the best possible forms of play for our children. A pocket-money toy and somewhere to skip, challenge a friend…

With Regency fashions currently cutting a dash across our screens, we have been immersing ourselves in the life of Grimaldi, the most popular English entertainer of the Regency Era. Born into a family of dancers and comic performers in the slum known as Clare Market, Covent Garden he was a principle performer at the Theatre…

5th May is ‘Children’s Day’ (Kodomo no hi) in Japan. Originally a celebration for boys ‘Tango-no-sekku’ is celebrated by displaying dolls. The ‘May Dolls’ called Gogatsu Ningyo are made to wish good fortune and health on the boys. In Japanese culture, it is often said that a human soul inhabits the body of a doll….

Our link to Pollock’s Toy Museum in Fitzrovia is through it’s founder Marguerite Fawdry. Growing up in London, I was a frequent visitor to the Museum and sometimes my parents would pack me off to stay with my surrogate grandparents Marguerite & Kenneth in Fitzrovia.  Me at Pollock’s Toy Museum in the 1970s Marguerite was…

  Do you think Fairy Tales are only book stories ? Are you one of those who believe that Fairy Tales can be seen only in movies or in theatre plays ?  Do you really believe those characters are unreachable and very distant from you ? Well… you might have to rethink all that. Benjamin…

I smile to myself when I think how ONLY Pollock’s customers would literally hold up the queue by dressing up as a 18th century society lady and turning up to Trafalgar Square. In 2015 we were running a workshop (for 20,000 people) at West End Live’s annual theatrical showcase.  Artist Olia Manizer, who came to Pollocks…