Dinky Toys

Ghost Corp Apparel — resurrecting iconic corporate ghosts.

Dinky Toys began in Liverpool in 1934, when Meccano Limited rechristened its Hornby Modelled Miniatures as “Meccano Dinky Toys.” Built at Meccano’s Binns Road works, the small die-cast cars, lorries, buses, aircraft, ships, figures and road accessories gave model railways—and bedroom floors—a properly industrial amount of traffic.

The Meccano prefix was dropped in 1935, but the Liverpool parent remained behind the castings. Dinky grew into one of Britain’s defining die-cast ranges, long before tiny cars became a global arms race of windows, opening doors, speed wheels and suspiciously optimistic suspension. Postwar Dinky Supertoys added larger commercial and military subjects to the fleet.

Financial trouble brought Meccano under Lines Bros. in 1964, folding Dinky into the Tri-ang orbit. When Lines Bros. collapsed in 1971, Meccano’s Binns Road assets moved through Maoford Limited to Airfix Industries. The Dinky Toys name was changed to Dinky in 1971, while production at Liverpool continued for several more years. Airfix closed the Binns Road factory in November 1979, ending the original Liverpool production era.

Our Dinky Toys collection celebrates the pocket-sized traffic jam: hefty little metal machines, chipped paint, improbable cargoes and the glorious belief that every living-room rug deserved its own motorway system. It is a salute to Liverpool casting, miniature horsepower and toys made with enough metal to alarm modern furniture.