Music Box
Toy theatre, or Juvenile drama, was a popular pastime in the 19th century. Scenes and characters from successful theatre productions would be illustrated and printed on sheets of paper. Adults and children alike would enjoy cutting out these figures and scenes to assemble into model theatres. These sheets could be brought plain for hand colouring at home, or already tinted for double the price. They became known as 'penny plain' or 'tuppence coloured'.
Object details
| Category | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | Paper, tinsel, plastic, glue, metal, pen and ink |
| Brief description | Model theatre showing a village scene, made up as a musical box using hand coloured toy theatre sheets and decorated with tinsel |
| Physical description | Model theatre made up as a musical box using hand coloured toy theatre sheets depicting a village scene. The proscenium arch is trimmed with gold coloured embossed tinsel. The exterior box is covered with blue paper decorated with a gold coloured fleur-de-lis repeating pattern, and has a transparent plastic window at the front also edged with tinsel. A metal winding key is inset on one side with the word 'REUGE' at its centre. |
| Dimensions |
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| Credit line | Harry R. Beard Collection, given by Isobel Beard. |
| Summary | Toy theatre, or Juvenile drama, was a popular pastime in the 19th century. Scenes and characters from successful theatre productions would be illustrated and printed on sheets of paper. Adults and children alike would enjoy cutting out these figures and scenes to assemble into model theatres. These sheets could be brought plain for hand colouring at home, or already tinted for double the price. They became known as 'penny plain' or 'tuppence coloured'. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | S.82-1988 |
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| Record created | February 23, 2012 |
| Record URL |
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