We just celebrated Children’s Day in India on 14-Nov and come 20-Nov, it is World Children’s Day. Toys and children are intrisically associated with one another and if childhood toys are something that gets you all nostalgic, visiting the Zürcher Spielzeugmuseum aka Zurich Toy Museum must be on your list. Yet another insighful museum in Zurich, this one is filled with toys that date back close to 300 years ago. A visit to this eclectic musuem is sure to take on a pleasant trip down memory lane.
Small but well organized, the Zürcher Spielzeugmuseum is now situated in a new location on Altstetterstrasse in the Altstetten area of Zurich canton. Having been here since September this year, the museum has a delightful display of toys which were played with by probably your grandparents and their grandparents too!
The collection is rich and truly adorable with a wide variety of toys and play items displayed right from the 18th century. The items on display include an exhaustive range of yesteryear trains, steam engines, station and market set ups. The settings are authentic with every detail like street lamps, building designs and even post boxes of the yore perfectly captured. The range of aeroplanes is exciting too.
Apart from vehicles, there are innumerable dolls decked up in fashionable attire which itself is a high point of the display. Doll house settings are a treat for the eyes which include impeccably created living rooms, bed rooms and kitchens. The details like the furniture, furnishings, kitchen utilities and even faux food is perfect to say the least. There are other setups like that of a school, bakery, grocery store and scenes that depict social life in the previous centuries. The toys displayed are rare and a treasure house of fond memories which is an ideal way to take a journey back in time. Do not miss the various wooden toys, antique board games as well as children’s books on display.
There are also special exhibits which are an ode to three wonder women: Sasha Morgenthaler, Margarethe Steiff and Barbie in the museum.
Details:
Zürcher Spielzeugmuseum
Sammlung Franz Carl Weber
Altstetterstrasse 127
8045 Zürich
Telefon +41 79 280 18 81
E-Mail zuercherspielzeugmuseum@fcw.ch