Classic Toy, Spotlight on Saskia Sharp Classic Toy, Spotlight on Saskia Sharp

Classic Toys | Rubik’s Cube

If you search for “The most popular toy in history” you will most definitely see mention of the Rubik’s cube.

Invented in 1974 by 30 year old Hungarian professor of Architecture and sculpture, Erno Rubik, the ever popular puzzle has been an all time classic for decades, stumping puzzlers young and old with its magical logic.

If you search for the most popular toy in history you will most definitely see mention of the classic Rubik’s Cube.

The six sided puzzle is made up of 26 plastic mini cubes often referred to as ‘cubies’ or ‘cubelets’ which all interlock in a way that prevents them being pulled apart. The object of the Rubik’s Cube is to solve the puzzle by lining up each side of the cube with the different colours.

Invented in 1974 by a 30 year old Hungarian professor of architecture and sculpture, Erno Rubik, the ever popular puzzle has been an all time classic for decades, stumping puzzlers young and old with its magical logic.

The Rubik’s Cube was was never meant to be a toy though. The inventor had the idea of constructing a handheld puzzle with the original intention being to help people understand three dimensional Geometry. The invention proved so curious however that it soon took the world by storm!

Erno Rubik got the patent for his creation in 1975 and paired with another Hungarian toy maker, they soon set the world on fire with this amazing toy, selling over 350 million cubes in the past 40 years.

Fun Fact: The original name for the Rubik’s Cube was the ‘Magic Cube’. It was renamed in 1980 to ‘Rubik’s Cube’, after the inventor as it was bizarrely felt that ‘Magic Cube’ invoked ideas about witchcraft.

The very first prototypes of the cube were made out of wooden blocks and paperclips, with the first test batches of a plastic cubes first being released into a toy shop in Budapest in 1977.

In 1980 the Rubik’s Cube won its first ‘Game of the Year’ award, with a staggering 200 million cubes being sold worldwide during the period 1980 – 1983. The Rubik’s Cube then went on to win ‘Toy of the Year’ two years in a row in 1980 and 1981, with ‘New Scientist’ magazine famously noting in 1981 that the Rubik’s Cube had:

‘Captivated the attention of children ages 7 – 70 all over the world this summer’.

Fun Fact: It took Erno Rubik over a month to finish his own puzzle!

The Rubik’s Cube craze kept growing and in 1981 the Rubik’s Cube was featured on the front cover of Scientific American, as an awe-inspiring advancement in science and technology. In the same year the first ever Super Cubing Championship was held by the Guinness Book of Records in Munich, for cubers to complete the puzzle in the quickest time possible. Jury Froeschl set the record for completing the cube in an amazing record time of 38 seconds!

That record was fabulously broken one year later by a Vietnamese student who set the record at 22.95 seconds. The current world record is an amazing 4.90 seconds held by a 14 year old boy since 2015. There is even a three year old from China who solved it in less than two minutes! Wow!!

Over the years the competitions have evolved to include variations such as solving the cube one handed, blindfolded, underwater, in a single breath and even using ones feet (that record stands at 20.57 seconds)! To this day however, no human has ever been able to beat a robot in completing this puzzle.

Fun Fact: Three of the top ten bestselling books of 1981 were books based on the Rubik’s Cube with the number one bestseller being, ‘The Simple Solution to Rubik’s Cube’, which sold a whopping six million copies.

During the 1980’s and 1990’s the Rubik’s Cube was still being marketed and sold but sales decreased. It wasn’t until the early 2000’s that sales began to soar again as retro toys became popular once again, with sales doubling between 2001 and 2003. In 2003 the first Rubik’s Cube Championships were held since 1982 with an astounding 83 participants.

Fun Fact: Less than 5.8% of the whole world’s population can solve the Rubik’s Cube.

2006 saw another rise in sales when Will Smith was shown solving the Rubik’s Cube in the popular movie The Pursuit of Happiness. The cube has also appeared in a number of other movies such as Despicable Me 3, Tron Legacy, Dude Where’s My Car, Armageddon, The Amazing Spiderman, Wall-E and Snowden. You can also catch a glimpse of the cube in the popular TV shows The Big Bang Theory, South Park and The Simpsons.

Fun Fact: The Rubik’s Cube has 43 quintillion possible configurations (that’s a million raised to the power of five!)

Read More
Halloween Saskia Sharp Halloween Saskia Sharp

Magic Toys - Trick or Treat?

Halloween, one of the biggest nights of the year is near upon us, and we’ve already started to think what the family theme for this year will be with our scary costumes. 

We love trick or treating, as we love to dress up, but more importantly we love taking part in the biggest dress up day on the planet, and seeing all of the effort everyone else has gone to, to go all out spooky! 

On All Hallows’ Eve there will only be one question on everyone’s lips ... 

Halloween, one of the biggest nights of the year is near upon us, and we’ve already started to think what the family theme for this year will be with our scary costumes. 

We love trick or treating, as we love to dress up, but more importantly we love taking part in the biggest dress up day on the planet, and seeing all of the effort everyone else has gone to, to go all out spooky! 

On All Hallows’ Eve there will only be one question on everyone’s lips ... 

Trick or Treat?

With the war on sugar and preservatives gathering momentum, we take a look at some of our other great alternatives to the traditional trick, (and if you like a bit of magic just like us ... you’re also in for a treat!).  

For the biggest trickster in the room there’s our awesome 125 trick magic box, with everything you need for the next Houdini or re-enactment of the epic Now You See Me movie. 

The variety of magic tricks set has a whopping 125 incredible magic tricks to practice, and it also includes a DVD with step by step instructions to watch while you practice.

Tricks include: Magic Hat, cups and balls, the paddle tricks, coin magic, thimble tricks, rings and rope tricks, to name but a few!

So get your magic on this Halloween and remember never reveal your secrets!

IMG_4401.JPG

Be the original prankster this Halloween with our Jokes In a Box set. Five awesome pranks that make it so very easy to catch out your friends and make them jump in surprise!

Includes the classic tricks of Fly & Spider, Goofy Teeth, Snake Eggs, Nail Through Finger and the timeless, Snappy Chewing Gum!

IMG_4399.JPG

This Mind Reading Magic Tricks set from Robert Frederick is great way to entertain everyone and leave them spooked at how you can read their minds!

This box contains 20 different tricks that you can perfect, including the Mind Reading Blackboard, The Haunted Choice, ESP Card Tricks and the Wizards Deck.

IMG_4400.JPG

Instant Illusions by Ridley’s Magic is a great collection of tricks to perform for your friends and family, leave them amazed by  tricks like the Magic Guillotine, X-ray Vision, Magic Rings and more!

Start your collection and master these tricks in time for Halloween and you will be able to treat your friends to some magical tricks!

The Magic Guillotine will have hearts racing as you perform this trick for your friends.

Simply get a brave friend to put their finger in the hole, then secretly put a pretzel stick (or similar) and into the whole in the bottom.

Push down on the top swiftly and watch as the guillotine magically misses their finger, but cuts thru the pretzel stick at the bottom! 

Argh!

Your friend will be reeling from the bloody escape that they’ve just narrowly missed (and you both get to enjoy half a pretzel each!).

IMG_4393.JPG
IMG_4394.JPG

The Ridley’s Floating Match trick will mystify your mates.

This simple magic trick has only 2 steps to completion but will have everyone asking “how” forevermore.

Your friends and family will be baffled by this simple yet effective classic trick.

 

IMG_4395.JPG

The Rope Cutter trick is an all time classic crowd pleaser that can be mastered easily by children (and adults!) of all ages.

Show people how you magically cut a rope in half and put it back together again, just follow the step by step instructions - easy and fun!

There are many variations of the classic cut and restore rope trick, but this one is one of our favourites. Never fails to amaze!

The Ridley’s Magic Handkerchief is a simple trick that can be performed by anyone with some practice.

In this little trick the handkerchief that is to disappear is seen up to the last moment. The requisites for the trick are very simple, yet trickily effective.

This is a very pretty and deceptive trick. Simply follow the instructions inside the box to perfect the tricks.

Have you ever wanted to have x-ray vision? Well now you can, With this little trick from the “Instant Illusions” collection.

FullSizeRender.jpg

Firstly, fold up the cardboard with the magic symbols into a cube,  then place it into the clear plastic cube. Now place the clear cube inside the bigger black cube (which also needs to be assembled), and put the lid on.

Now hand over the black box to the person you’re performing for and ask them to chose a picture.

If you follow the simple step by step instructions included in the box, you will never fail to always know which picture someone has picked! And they will never know how to perform this great trick.

Master the magic in minutes!  

IMG_4398.JPG

Our Magic Linking Rings from Ridleys is a traditional Chinese Magic Ring trick that has been performed by magicians for hundreds of years.

There has been many variations made to this ring trick, which is thought o be a classic of illusion magic.

In the traditional effect, solid metal rings appear to link and unlink, pass through each other, and form chains and other complex patterns and configurations.

This trick needs a lot of practice to perfect but once you do, you’ll be able to trick anyone!

For something completely different, why not try our fantastic Scary Hands temporary tattoos from NPW. Transform your hands into scary hands and scare everyone in sight!

The tattoos are easy to put on with water, and fantastic for encouraging creative play. Create a horror scene, a Halloween scene, or even a monster party.  There's no limit to the imagination, and they’ll be guaranteed to scare!

Whatever you choose … trick or treat … we hope you have a spooky spectacular Halloween!

Read More