Benaki Toy Museum

The Maria Argyriadi donation is the core of the Benaki Toy Museum’s collection, one of the ten best in Europe. It presents toys, books, literature, clothing and childhood objects from Europe, Africa, Asia and America.

The collections include 20,000 toys, games and childhood objects, from antiquity to 1970, from Greece and the wider Greek world, as well as from Europe, America, Africa and the East. The aim of the Toy Museum is to document all aspects of the themes of “childhood”, “play” and “toys” by studying the history of toys in Greece and Europe, as well as the daily life of children in a traditional Greek context.

The Greek section of the collection includes infant and children’s toys from the Classical, Roman, Byzantine, and post-Byzantine periods, handmade traditional Greek toys from the 18th to the 20th centuries, items from national festivals, commercial products from the 20th century, team sports, board games, and seasonal games. A separate group of objects includes reconstructions of popular toys from the beginning of the 20th century, made by members of the K.A.P.I. (Open Care Centres for the Elderly).

The European part of the collection includes dolls and games of urban and rural manufacture from the 17th to the 20th centuries, mainly from England, France and Germany, as well as European regional costume dolls of the 19th and 20th centuries, dressed in costumes from various regions of Greece. Books and studies on children and toys, archival sources, photographs, information on Greek toy manufacturers, 3,000 books on children’s literature and education, or general reference works, constitute a specialized library open to all interested parties. The collection of children’s toys and games, as well as rich archival material, is housed in the Kouloura building.