Plastic Flowers "No", Gnomes "Never" - Yet Plasticine has its Day at Chelsea

To The Toy Detective, the Chelsea Flower Show is little more than a reminder that it's time to think about swopping the felt trilby for a straw hat. However, this year a particular show garden has provided a surprising and controversial interest for many, including yours truly.

James May, as-seen-on-TV's Top Gear (a show that's not about fine clothing), presented a garden made with Plasticine. Which, being at the Royal Horticultural Society's most prestigious event, certainly got some rather un-amused looks from the more conservative show-goers. In fact, the appearance of a gnome in another garden brought both outrage as well as references to the rule-book.

Big news as it obviously was to anyone glancing at Britain's media in the last week, what really elevates it to major news status (for me at least) was its mention on BBC Radio 4's News Quiz.

Thankfully and to my delight, the garden will soon be exhibited at London's South Bank Centre. After all the hard graft of sculpture, it would be a terrible shame to let it decline into a greying blob that merely retained a talent for collecting fluff and hair.

The Daily Telegraph: Top Gear's James May designs Plasticine garden for Chelsea Flower Show
The Daily Telegraph: James May's Plasticine garden wins special award at Chelsea Flower Show 2009
The Daily Telegraph: Plasticine garden goes on to major arts centre

Be Careful What You Wish For or Just Keep it Zipped

Koumpounophobia n fear or aversion of buttons

Already in cinemas, Coraline has been adapted from Neil Gaiman's best-selling book. It looks great, it's dark and it's a little bit scary in places, which will come as no surprise to those familiar with the work of Henry Selick, director of The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Coraline is the first ever feature length film to be shot entirely in stop-motion, spectroscopic 3-D. This labour intensive process required 512 photographs for each second of moving picture.

The cast includes: Dakota Fanning, Teri Hatcher, Keith David, Robert Bailey Jr., John Hodgman, Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French and Ian McShane.

Coraline is in cinemas now, rated: PG.

"The Other Mother", Philip Pullman on Neil Gaiman's book.

What a Wuv-er-ly Baby

We've seen a lot of toys over the years at The Toy Detective Agency and in recent weeks I've received a few probing questions that, whilst in no way giving me a misty eyed sense of nostalgia, do take my mind back to the early-1990s when toys became my way of earning a living.

One such memory is that of a battery operated soft toy called Wuv Luvs. Available in various bright and pastel colours these strange looking creatures were blessed with the miracle of birth.

Playing with Wuv Luv for a while would eventually lead to Wuv Luv announcing: "Here comes baby." A kangaroo-like pouch would open to reveal an egg or, in the case of one in a dozen of the toys sold, two eggs.

Opening the eggs would reveal the babies that could interact with mummy Wuv Luv saying cute phases and by singing alternative lines of the song Isty Bitsy Spider and the ABC song.

Accessories included with the toy were a hair brush, some plastics flowers to provide the Wuv Luvs with something to eat and an all important key, which would allow you to make mummy give birth again.

"Scary" is a word often used to describe what were very popular soft toys. When you got the toy home you'd find that Wuv Luv gives birth to the sound of much whirring and clacking. There was also no volume control and Wuv Luvs speak loudly.

Wuv Luvs had a come-back in 2000 as Wuvvies.

May the Forth Be With You

Having not, thankfully, developed any kind of Star Wars fanaticism, I managed to thoroughly enjoy yesterday's bank holiday in a blissful fashion, untroubled by the fact that it was apparently Star Wars Day.

That was until later in the day when I checked my email and, this was my mistake, I logged into Twitter, where there was trickling stream of quotes from the famous movie.

Quotes! - because, of course, dialogue is what the Star Wars films are best remembered for. I shall save you, dear reader, from what I had to witness. Suffice to say that each and every quote was a fine example of pushing the the plot along with the odd word here and there so not to detract from the next incoming action sequence.

So, should I dutifully add May the forth to next years diary; in order to post an article to mark the occasion?