page_title: Benjamin Pollock's Toy Shop
section_title: Move to Covent Garden
hierarchical_section_title: Benjamin Pollock's Toy Shop / Move to Covent Garden
caption_attribution_description: English: Interior of Benjamin Pollock's Toy Shop in Covent Garden
context_page_description: Benjamin Pollock's Toy Shop is a shop selling vintage and retro toys in London's Covent Garden. Opened in 1980, The Shop is named after the last great Toy theatre Maker of London Benjamin Pollock who ran a shop selling Toy theatres in Hoxton in 1877-1937. Coronation Street actor Peter Baldwin co-owned the shop from 1988 to his death in 2015. Located at 44 The Market Building, Benjamin Pollock's Toy Shop specialises in Victorian toy theatres, both original and reproduction, in addition to books, puppets, music boxes and other traditional toys.
context_section_description: Under Marguerite Fawdry's ownership Pollock's became one of the first shops to open in the newly renovated Covent Garden Piazza building in 1980. In 1988 she sold the shop to Christopher Baldwin and his brother Peter Baldwin, a toy theatre collector and actor best known for his role of Derek Wilton in the UK soap opera Coronation Street, who had been the shop's manager between acting jobs. In 2008 Christopher Baldwin retired and Louise Heard, who had worked in the shop since the 1980s, became the co-owner with Peter Baldwin. In 2010 they opened a second shop in Stable Yard at Hatfield House. Since Peter Baldwin's death in 2015 the shop has been run by Louise Heard. Adult customers have included Charlie Chaplin and Joanna Lumley.
  Today the shop produces its own range of toy theatres by contemporary artists such as Kate Baylay and Clive Hicks-Jenkins which have been displayed at Liberty, Fortnum & Mason and the Royal Opera House. It sells reproduction and original toy theatres from around the world in addition to books, puppets, music boxes and other traditional toys.
caption: Selection of toy theatres at Pollock's
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