IMAGINATION IN THE EVERDAY
Whether you have children of your own or you think back to your own childhood of discovery and invention… It’s a time when your imagination ran wild and you could create stories out of nothing. Remind yourself of when the back of the sofa was actually a place to launch your rocket, a pile of cushions made a trepidous mountain for your favourite toy to climb and the dining room chair legs made an excellent slalom for your cars to race around. I’m sure you also remember as a child waiting patiently for the last squeeze of liquid to be used from the washing up liquid bottle or for the final egg to be taken from the egg box just so that you could turn your latest idea into your best creation ever.
Well, there’s a new kind of toy in town, helping kids to become young inventors by turning the contents of their recycling bin into toys that really work. Family-owned environmentally conscious toy brand Planet JUNKO’s kits mean kids can transform old boxes, juice cartons or food tubs into toys with reusable parts made from recycled plastic. Pete Rope, Planet JUNKO’s inventor came up with the idea when he was making a junk model car with his twin boys and they came up short when they got to the wheels. ‘I remember Blue Peter when I was a kid’ said Pete, ‘they always had skewers, cotton bobbins and all sorts of stuff we never had. We supply all those tricky bits and give kids super powers to make whatever they can imagine. We’re a really fun mix of art, craft and STEM play. Our kits even have fittings for Lego bricks and figures.’
Planet JUNKO has captured the imagination of kids and the press – it was picked for Mumsnet’s best STEM toys of 2021, and won a coveted 2021 Made for Mums Editor’s Choice Award for Eco-Creativity.
Sustainability is high on the agenda too, the kits are manufactured in the EU from recycled plastic, packaged plastic-free and can be used again and again. Designing and making your own toys is way more satisfying for kids and better for their development than just getting bought new stuff which eventually breaks, gets thrown away and ends up in landfill.
Planet JUNKO make a range of kits starting at £14.99 for the Epic Cereal Box Creations Book which includes 30 x Magic Corners – or you can buy a larger Zoomer!, Water! or Build! Kit which make working vehicles, boats and buildings.
