Designed for Reclining: KLIPPAN

Me and the Missus have been going to Ikea since 1981. We went to our first one on the continent and we bought a bookcase called Billy and a sofa called Klippan.

So I was chuffed to see that Klippan is classed as a timeless classic by Ikea now as you can see in this snap I took last month. 

In the 90's and 00's my own Ikea wants became display cabinets for toys and amazingly I still have them today.

Did you or do you have a Klippan sofa, Billy bookcase or an Ikea display cabinet for your toys and treasures readers?

JEEP CHOOS

 

I've been looking at this Rico page from a Spanish toy catalogue dated 1971.

There's a couple of interesting items.

The gun jeep at the top appears to be a colourful variation of the Desert Jeep I loved as a kid and pictured below.

There's at least one other Spanish version of this too, by prolific toysters Clim.

Below the jeep on the Rico page is a colourful train set.

We've seen this before released by many different outfits, the most interesting for us being Century 21 Toys covered a few times on MC.

Did you have any of these toys on the Rico page?

A BILLY CHRISTMAS

Responding to my call for pics of your younger selves with your childhood toys, here's Martin D's from Canada proud as punch with his huge 7 in 1 Billy Blastoff boxed set one Christmas!

That Hot Wheels set looks pretty darn nifty too!

Those were the days. Black and white but we had a ball!

Thanks Martin.

Anymore childhood toys snaps?

Email at the bottom of the page.

A BLAST OF LIGHTNING!

The other day I mentioned I had got hold of 2 loose Johnny Lightnings from 1971.

Mine came without their plastic accessories.

In original complete condition the Twin Blaster for instance would look like this all souped up with yellow fins.

Not wanting to recreate these plastic parts per se, I hoped to be inspired by them and the overall vibe of the car instead.

First of all I silvered the side engines with a paint pen and reddened the body with a sharpie. Then I went to town!

Hope you like my artistic licence readers!

COAST GUARD SHADO 2

I just love this photo I saw on flickr of a US Coastguard vehicle in Sturgeon Bay by Garrit Speckhard.

I'm not entirely sure of its a boat or a land vehicle or both but its got Gerry Anderson chops in spades!

It would have looked great on Thunderbirds!

There's a real SHADO vibe to the front especially when you think of Mike Trim's original concept.

What do you think?

The Dark Lightyears

With Disney Pixar's latest adventure just around the corner, the Mattel Lightyear toys are beginning to get noticed a lot more, so I thought I would grab one of the larger ships while I had the chance.

Zurg is Buzz Lightyear's adversary and in the new film takes the form of a 12' android. So the Zurg Fighter is a deal larger than the other ships in the Hyperspeed range, to fit in scale. It comes with a nicely detaild Zurg figure, at around 2" high.

The ship itself is moulded in deep violet plastic, with lime green accents and has an insectile feel to it, with overlapping armour plates and landing gear like beetle legs.

Unlike Buzz's ships, it also sports firing missiles, which is a nice theowback to classic space toys, rather than the tedious sound effects and flashing lights of the last few years.

The next wave of models is due out next month, including the vast Mothership model! To the toyshop and beyond!

 

BOXES AND BOXES AND MORE BOXES!

Its strange seeing all your stuff boxed up and piled into an island in the middle of the rooms.

I'm not sure where it all came from and we're unsure where it will all go once the house is decorated!

This is our big heap of boxes in the kitchen diner.

Moonbase mutt Blue is looking for his dogbowl. I think we've boxed it up! 

Have you been decorated?

STRUCK BY LIGHTNING!

 I was thrilled last week to actually have won something on the Bay!

For a modest sum I managed to bag two super cool Johnny Lightning die-cast cars from US outfit Topper.

Dating from 1971 these beauties were part of Topper's own bash at redline styling and I think they did a brilliant job. I never knew about them as a kid I don't think but I've got the bug now! I'm genuinely struck!

Bigger in size than Hot Wheels redlines, the red one is the Twin Blaster and the gold one is Pipe Dream. Lightning really did strike twice!

Do you like them?

Lacking the plastic parts that they originally came with, I'm still bowled over with the styling of these toy cars. A little touching up next week and they'll be display-ready as soon as I get my cabinet back out.

I'll keep you posted about any Johnny progress.

Have you got any Johnnies?