Miniature porcelain menagerie

Not strictly the sort of present any right-thinking kid would write off to Santa for, Whimsies were cheap (only a few decimal pence in the halcyon days of childhood), twee (glazed pottery hedgehogs and corgis - puh-lease!) and ubiquitous (hands up who didn’t own one - not so fast at the back there, Collins!). However, they maintained a stable and moderate popularity because they were, above all else, collectable. And there are two unassailable truths about anything kids start to collect (Panini stickers, comics, Star Wars figures); one, it’s almost impossible to complete a collection; two, kids will spend all their pocket money trying to prove otherwise.

It was a fact not taken too lightly by George Wade Pottery which, following a huge drop in the demand for industrial ceramics after the war, decided to reintroduce their retail line of pre-War animal figurines in 1953 (and again in 1971). The newly-boxed fauna proved to be a far larger success than even Wade could have imagined. “Whimsies”, as they were called, were a damned good way for parents to bribe their offspring to stop fighting/be quiet on a long car journey/visit to the dentist. They could also be presented in their own display case (the germ of a thousand commemorative plate collections). However, we find it especially ironic that whilst encouraging a generation to invest their entire pre-pubescent income in such hollow (literally) property, it was Wade who attracted kids to the delights of banking as they approached adolescence. For, when Griffin was offering dictionaries and sports bags over at the Midland¹, Nat West responded with a set of collectable porcelain pigs which themselves were simply overgrown Whimsies with a splash more personality².