“I used to be asked what are the qualifications for being in the toy industry and I said I think there are two: one is, an eye for detail, because children are fascinated by detail and little things that open and shut and how they work and stuff, and secondly, a mental age of about seven, and I think to be truthful, I qualified on both counts.”[1]
“Running Berwick’s Toy Company proved enormously appealing since I discovered I had a real interest in toys and in industry and, with five young children at home, a home-based research centre.”[2]
“As our children grew up they were extremely unruly and, of course, did an enormous amount of crayoning, drawing and painting. In fact it was almost impossible to stay at a hotel with them on holiday because their first instinct would be to crayon all over the bedroom walls..”[3]
“I came up with a solution. I bought a 30’ Bedford chassis and delivered it to Plaxtons the coach builders in Scarborough. They kindly built a body on it to my design which, when equipped, meant that we could sleep nine people in it, with a motor scooter in the boot and a small sailing dingy on a vast roof rack. I think we had the first, the best and undoubtedly the biggest campervan in the business.” [4]
The impact of family life on creative ideas and inventions, the lateral thinking of the practicalities of family holidays and transportation could be considered to have sparked Torquil Norman’s ideas for container toys, leading to his setting up of Bluebird in 1981 to manufacture a particular design classic in British Toy manufacturing history – more tomorrow. Cuppa anyone?
[1] British Toy Making Project: Mr. Torquil Norman, Bluebird Toys, interview transcript, p32-33 interview conducted by Ieuan Hopkins and Sarah Wood, September 2010, edited by Torquil Norman and Sarah Wood, August 2013
[2] Torquil Norman, Kick the Tyres, Light the Fires: One man’s vision for Britain’s future and how we can make it work p49, published by Infinite Ideas, 2010: UK
[3] Torquil Norman, Ibid p41-42
[4] Torquil Norman, Ibid p42
The Big Yellow Teapot & the beginning of Bluebird