Ostheimer wooden toys

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Margarete Ostheimer GmbH
legal form Company with limited liability
founding 1939
Seat Zell unter Aichelberg GermanyGermanyGermany 
management Wolfgang Schühle
Stephan Zech
Sibylle Engstrom
As of December 31, 2015

The Margarete Ostheimer GmbH better known as Ostheimer wooden toys is a 1939 Adeline and Walter Ostheimer based maker of wooden toys based in Zell unter Aichelberg . The Swabian family company produces reform toys in line with the anthroposophical worldview and the ideas of Waldorf education . The wooden toys produced are consciously aimed at promoting child development.

history

Waldorf school toys

The founder of anthroposophy, Rudolf Steiner , suggested that older children should make toys for younger children in handicraft classes. In particular, he attached great importance to moving toys. The resulting designs were produced in series by Julia Charlotte Mellinger's Waldorf-Spielzeug und Verlag GmbH from 1926 and distributed worldwide. During the Second World War, however, the National Socialists forced the company to produce ammunition boxes instead of toys and then spun off from the publishing company.

Klaus toys

After the closure and conversion into a factory for ammunition boxes, the painter Walter Ostheimer and his future wife Adeleine Mumm worked on founding a toy company that was to produce Rudolf Steiner's toys in line with anthroposophical pedagogy. The company has been producing in Unterwössen since 1943 as "Klaus toys" under the name of the couple's only son. After the Second World War , a small terraced house in Stuttgart served as the family company's production facility. In 1948, however, the demand for wooden toys fell suddenly, plastic and plush toys began to flood the market, and so Walter and Adeline Ostheimer had to give up their property in 1951 and stop the production of wooden toys.

Margarete Ostheimer

In 1957 Walter and Adeline Ostheimer started again with the production of their own wooden toys after meeting the " Art and Play " founder Michael Peter, who felt the need to support the reconstruction of educational toys. Initially, jumping jacks and movable wall pictures were made from plywood . After the death of her father in 1965, Margarete Ostheimer took over the family business. She designed simple wooden play figures based on the anthroposophical worldview . The figures are borrowed from nature, characteristic of Ostheimer figures is the reduction to the essentials in order to support the children's imagination and creativity. In 1967, after several moves, the company settled in Zell unter Aichelberg and started producing under the name "Margarete Ostheimer".

Walter and Adeline Ostheimer Foundation

In the 1970s there was an upswing in demand for ecological toys in Germany. The first homeworkers were hired and the collection of wooden figures was constantly being expanded. In 1992 a new shipping and administration building was built for the company. In 2001 Margarete Ostheimer resigned the management and transferred the company to the Walter and Adeline Ostheimer Foundation . In 2003 the company Kinderkram was taken over . Since 2009 the manufactory has been operating under the name Margarete Ostheimer GmbH . After the licenses from Konrad Keller GmbH were taken over in 2003, the toy manufacturer was bought up in 2011. In addition to the traditional wooden figures, the company now also produces wooden vehicles and rocking horses , such as the successful Peter model .

Ostheimer's profits go to the foundation, which donates part of it to educational projects. Only wood from southern German forests is used in production. Employees are preferably employed from the municipality of Zell unter Aichelberg. Some of the workplaces are reserved for disabled people with the intention of integrating them into the normal world of work.

production

Every year around one million wooden figures are handcrafted from around 700 cubic meters of wood. Most of the production takes place in 200 external workshops and at home. The play and crib figures are made from sustainably grown wood, mainly maple wood. Around a third of the manufactory's turnover is achieved with natural nativity figurines. The manufactory's range includes around 500 different figures. Ostheimer wooden figures are now sold online, in toy shops , at Christmas markets and, among other things, in the drugstore chain dm .

The crib figures in particular are sold internationally as far as the USA , South Korea and Japan . Ostheimer cribs can be found in the holdings of numerous toy and crib museums. In 2005/2006 the Jewish Museum Berlin showed an Ostheimer nativity scene in the special exhibition Chrismukkah - Stories of Christmas and Hanukkah .

From November 2016 to February 2017, the retrospect Magic Play Worlds for young and old - wooden figures by Margarete Ostheimer was shown at Mainau Castle .

Awards and social commitment

In 2009 Ostheimer Holzspielzeug GmbH received an award for exemplary occupational safety and received certification for "Occupational health and safety through organization" from the Göppingen district . The company has supported numerous social and cultural projects for decades; u. a. 2014 the state horticultural show in Schwäbisch Gmünd or the integrative workshops of the Bad Boll working and living community .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The fine things. Of knights and noble damsels. Ostheimer's wooden knight's castle . In: NZZ . August 17, 2004.
  2. ↑ a b Akiko Lachenmann: There is no place for smiling dinosaurs . In: Stuttgarter Zeitung . December 17, 2003, p. 25 .
  3. ↑ Andreas v. Grunelius: On the history of J. Ch. Mellinger Verlag. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  4. ^ Waldorf Education Today: A Little History of Toys. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  5. ↑ a b c Julia Förch: Typical for the country. Small world to understand . In: Stuttgarter Nachrichten . March 5, 2005, p. 50 .
  6. ^ A b Margarete Ostheimer. t2 FRG. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  7. ^ Margarete Ostheimer GmbH [wooden toys as a family task]. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  8. ↑ Company with social commitment . In: Südwest Presse . June 17, 2014 ( online ).
  9. ↑ a b Annette Dowideit: Cribs for a better world. Die Welt, December 23, 2009, accessed October 16, 2017 .
  10. ^ Ostheim forest animals. dm.de. October 15, 2017. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  11. ↑ Thorsten Beck, Michal S. Friedlander, Miriam Goldmann, Martina Lüdicke & Signe Rossbach: Christmukkah - Stories between Christmas and Hanukkah. Jewish Museum Berlin, 2006, accessed on October 16, 2017 .
  12. ↑ Winter exhibition 2016/17. Retrieved October 16, 2017 .
  13. ^ Margarete Ostheimer GmbH. Good toys need responsibility and values. Retrieved October 15, 2017 .
  14. ^ The Ostheimer company becomes a partner of the State Garden Show . In: Südwest Presse . March 12, 2014 ( online ).