Christmas always gets me reminiscing about those fabulous toys I had as an anklebiter back in the swingin' Sixties. One of the many themes of games and toys that Santa (or could it have been my Mum and Dad?) sprinkled a little of his magic over was paint. I loved drawing as a nipper and painting stuff was a natural extension. I have a vivid memory of painting a big red fire engine at Primary School during one of the class's countless 'topics'. I also remember clearly drawing loads of redline HotWheels cars whilst laid up ill in bed. I can still see the lined graph paper I used for these drawings (why?), done with a classic fat multi-colour biro - it had about 20 colours! Of the many artistic toys that I had I can now only bring one clearly to mind - the wonderful PAINT WHEELS by Denys Fisher, a sort of wheel on a stick that painted shapes in lines. I loved it! Pictured below in all its glory in that beautiful style so typical of Sixties and Seventies box art.
Now the second paint toy that I had was called something like MIST-O-PAINT or MIST-O-MATIC? It came in a huge box and basically you dribbled coloured paint into a rotating drum and when it stopped you had amazing paintings worthy of Jackson Pollock! I absolutely loved this toy and was lucky enough to find another one at a boot sale some years ago, but where it's hiding in my bulging loft is anybody's guess. I can't be sure of its name so I've not found anything on the net, except for a sample of the sort of masterpeices possible as shown below.
I will just have to find this toy in my attic to prove I'm not going nuts.
its got to be the Spiro-Matic! What a mess!
ReplyDeletehttp://retrodundee.blogspot.com/2009/12/favourite-60s-toy-spiro-matic.html
ive still got a couple of the actual paintwheels themselves too! Great fun! Another classic was 'Paint Witch', felt pens with witches hats and faces on the barrels!
ReplyDeletePaint Witch! Now that's cool! A monster-paint crossover, I love it! Pictures please! And Spiro-Matic - yes, I can almost feel my hand dribbling paint into the twirling cauldren of fun! Brilliant blog link too - tons of spiro-graph meisterwerks. Great to see that there are more Sixties Seventies fans blogging on the net!
ReplyDeletePaint Witch! Now that's cool! A monster-paint crossover, I love it! Pictures please! And Spiro-Matic - yes, I can almost feel my hand dribbling paint into the twirling cauldren of fun! Brilliant blog link too - tons of spiro-graph meisterwerks. Great to see that there are more Sixties Seventies fans blogging on the net!
ReplyDeleteI have just found Paint Witch, paint wheels, mist-o matic and square art all complete in my mothers attic!! any idea where to get spare paint for them?
ReplyDeletePaint Wheels just uses the inside of fibre tip pens - just pull the end of a felt pen and pull out the soft resorvoir and drop it into the handle. Not sure about paint Witch, but mist o matic etc should accept watered down poster paint, just make the consistency like creamy milk.
ReplyDeletethank you so much! Paint witch looks like inside of a felt tip now I look closely at them. Will buy some pens and hope it all still works :-)
ReplyDeletethe other thing to try is to check if the paint witch refills smell like they might be spirit based. If there no discernable smell, they would be water based and might respond to a few drops of water based ink. Good luck! Ive still got a couple of paint wheels if youre missing any too!
ReplyDeleteI NEED a Paint Wheels. :)
ReplyDeleteWhere can I get one?
One of the best toys of my childhood.
Best place to look would be Ebay for an original Paint Wheels. Or take a chance at a a few car Boot Sales maybe.
ReplyDelete"Painting with Paint Wheels see the pretty colours. Painting with Paint Wheels see the patterns go" I think was the ditty, but then I was only a small child watching the ad on T.V. I also wanted this toy so much, but my family were poor so my Dad bought a very cheap version from a Cheap Jack's shop, he gave me the wheels, and only the wheels, I had to use my fingers instead, I was a genius to think of that.
ReplyDeleteI was so pleased to read this! I had both of these toys as christmas presents and loved them both so much. I have on the odd occasion tried to explain the 'paint wheels' box set to others and not one person knew what I was talking about! looking at the photograph above I immediately filled with joy! I can remember the smell of he box and the hours of fun that I enjoyed. Sadly the rubbers perished on the wheels and so that particular toy did not remain in my collection.
ReplyDeleteThe 'Spiro -matic' however has survived - My own children (now in their 30s) have played with it too - how about that! I am sure that both of these toys encouraged many children like myself to explore their creative side and I only wish that young children of today could be able to enjoy these innocent toys in the same way. Thanks for the memories :)
Glad you enjoyed the memories of Paint Wheels and Spiro Matic. they were wonderful toys and as you say brought out our artistic side as well. I have super fond memories of them too as if it was yesterday.
DeleteTwirl-o-Paint was another similar toy, ca. 1975.
ReplyDeleteThanks for that Mama! Yes it was! 75, what a great year! I was 14 and lovin life.
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