Top of Page The History of the Toy Theatre

The following gives a brief outline of the histroy and development of our Miniature Toy Theatres.

The first theatre was created as a birthday present for a theatrical child who had a dolls house. The idea came from the toy theatre designed for the nursery in Queen Marys Dolls House at Windsor Castle.

Further research showed that the commercially available toy theatres of the Victorian era were far more intricately decorated. They were printed on card and hand painted. The toy theatre was a particularly popular form of home entertainment at this time.

The theatres are a joint effort between husband and wife, Tom & Alison Loftus. From dimentions taken from a full size toy theatre in Pollock's Toy Museum Covent Garden, London a 1/12 scale plan was drawn up. Model shop timber is used for the main structure.


Alison designs the theatre frontage, scenery and players. These are drawn onto artists line board and printed on paper. They are then hand painted and passed over to Tom for mouting on to the theatre base.

Players and scenery can be stored under the stage in a small box which Tom makes out of card. This box also has a coloured label with the name of the pantomime stored inside. Extra pantomimes or plays are availiable and come in their own storage box.

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